Improving housing, improving health: the need for collaborative working.

The impact of poor housing on health was recognized 150 years ago, and doing something about it was the first real public health initiative. Today, standards in much of the older housing stock continue to fall and, exacerbated by the current free market boom in fuel costs, many people cannot afford to heat or maintain their homes. In response to this crisis, there is an increasing amount of housing help available which would directly improve the health of patients but, apart from pockets of exemplary practice, most health practitioners seem to do little about it. Yet housing issues feature prominently in nurse training, as well as receiving increasing emphasis through the current national and regional fuel poverty initiatives. In exploring this paradox the author examines the mixed fortunes of an innovative project which tried to stimulate collaborative working between professions by providing a successful combined health and housing intervention. Drawing on his evaluation of this project over five years, he considers what some of the barriers to collaboration might be, how they arise and what needs to be done to overcome them.