Alvin's story

Alvin (name changed) slept rough for 15 years in a tent on the outskirts of Dundee after suffering a mental breakdown and quitting his job.

He was supported to access emergency accommodation by a member of the public. Dundee City Council’s Housing Options then referred for housing support by our housing first programme.

During 6-week assessment Alvin, alongside his Key Worker (Kevin), decided he would like support in all aspects of independent living including

• Accessing benefits as he had not claimed any for 15 years,
• Accessing GP as he had not actively been seen by a medical professional in over 15 years
• Accessing mental health support
• Accessing safe and secure tenancy
• Re-connecting with family
• Social isolation support
• Cooking
• Budgeting

During the 6-week assessment and further, Alvin was able to build up a strong working relationship with Kevin, seeing him most days. This enabled him to build trust which was key in finding out what support needs there were. During this time, he was able to listen to Alvin and find out that he had been in hospital on a number of occasions. These were due to Alvin sourcing food stuff from bins and unfortunately eating something which caused him to have a stomach infection.

Alvin was able to get registration to GP and proceed with a full work up which meant Alvin was then prescribed medication for COPD which had been undetected to that point.

As Alvin had been living “off grid” for such a long time, he had no form of ID which caused some issues originally for him to be able to claim UC.

Alvin was offered a tenancy through RSL in sheltered complex.

In the time that Alvin was supported by our service he was able to

• Register at GP and have all primary care needs support
• Support through CMHT for his mental wellbeing
• Access a safe, secure and adequate tenancy in a sheltered complex
• Access full benefit allowance
• Access and responsibly learn and use IT
• Re-connect with his family
• Build relationships and connections in his local area
• Learn safe food handling skills/cooking skills

He has successfully graduated on to a different support agency which check in on him once per week.