Improving health and social care together

Welcome to our latest blog, bringing you up to date with our work as the independent champion for people using health and social care services in North Yorkshire.

An engaging round-up

Thank you to all those people who regularly share their experiences and feedback with us at our engagement events, focus groups, surveys and by phone or email. We continue to hear from a wide variety of people from across the county, from Scarborough to Selby, Richmond to Ryedale, and beyond. Over the last six months we’ve heard from over 1,000 people. All the feedback that we receive is used to help us influence and work with our health and social care partners to help bring about service changes and improvements. Issues such as a shortage of NHS dentists, access to GP services and delays in hospital treatment remain areas of concern for the public.

What else have we been up to?

We have recently been working across North Yorkshire to hear from people about their experiences of accessing mental health services – to understand the challenges, what’s working well, and what can be improved. We’ve had a great response and have heard from over 360 people across many different communities including veterans, older people, neurodiverse people, carers and the farming community. The findings from this engagement will help to shape the development and delivery of new models of care for people living with a mental health condition and people with a severe mental illness.

The ongoing issues and their effects

The issues facing our NHS and social care system remain priority topics for our politicians and national Government and these have been compounded by the cost of living crisis, workforce shortages, national strikes, alongside increased waiting times for people accessing hospital and GP appointments. Healthwatch North Yorkshire, for example, has heard that the cost of living crisis has impacted on every aspect of people’s lives, from people having to reduce the amount of energy used, reducing the food that they buy, and limiting the amount of social activities that people undertake. All of this has negatively impacted on people’s health and wellbeing.

Working closely with nursing and care homes

We’re pleased to say that we have been working with care homes across North Yorkshire as part of our enter and view programme where we have visited care homes to hear from residents, family and friends, as well as care staff to understand their experiences of the services provided. Our visits have been undertaken by trained volunteers (authorised representatives) and have focused on understanding the quality of care provided, cleanliness of the homes, happiness of the residents, activities provided, and safety during the pandemic. The feedback we have received to-date has been predominantly positive, and when we have identified concerns, these have been acknowledged and plans have been put in place to remedy these by the individual care provider. We will continue our enter and view programme throughout the year.

And finally...

The support that we receive from our volunteers is incredible and we couldn’t achieve what we do today without their support – so thank you to everyone who has volunteered for us. In addition, our volunteers have contributed to our many projects and research, helped at our outdoor events, and represented us at health and social care meetings. They have truly played a key role in the work and running of Healthwatch North Yorkshire.