Updated community MSK handbook shares good practice for establishing Community Appointment Days (CADs)

Community Appointment Days (CADs) aim to provide holistic health and wellbeing support in a community setting by bringing together health services, social care and community partners in one accessible location, such as a community centre.

The GIRFT handbook was produced to offer checklists against which community MSK leads and ICSs could assess their practice and delivery of services. It signposts to resources that support practitioners to: 

• Optimise referrals to community triage and therapies services.  
• Ensure appropriate triage is in place to recognise urgent conditions requiring onward referral to secondary care. 
• Deliver rehabilitation and self-management.  
• Reduce number of ‘did not attend’ (DNA) incidences and implement patient- initiated follow-up (PIFU) appointments.

The update for December 2025 contains checklists and resources to support teams in establishing successful CADs have been added to GIRFT’s updated Further Faster handbook for community MSK.