Healthwatch Brighton and Hove - Annual Report 2019
This year's Annual Report, showcasing the views of the people of Brighton & Hove, and the hard work of our volunteers, staff and board throughout the year.
Highlights from our year
Practice visits and engagement leading to service improvements
- We undertook 28 visits to health and social care services to talk to people about their experiences
- We reached 727 people to hear their views about services
- We conducted interviews with 81 patients at Royal Sussex County Hospital and as their homes to ask them about their experience of discharge from hospital and care at home
- We conducted assessments of 9 home care providers by talking to 149 people in their homes
- We undertook 16 environmental audits and Patient - Led Assessments of the Care Environment (PLACE) in Brighton hospitals
- 257 recommendations to services were made as a result of these visits which led to 179 actions to improve practice. An estimated 250,000 patients benefitted from these changes
Communicating the voice of the patient through media
- We did 57 interviews for local radio, newspapers and television
- Our website had over 28,000 hits
- We produced 4 copies of our Healthwatch magazine, with 1,200 digital copies of each edition sent to subscribers reaching an estimated audience of 4,800 people across Brighton and Hove
- We had 1,722 Twitter and 594 Facebook followers
- Our Facebook posts reached over 53,0000 people
Volunteer Contribution
- Our volunteers contributed many hours for service visits and strategic meetings attended
- Volunteers' contributed work worth a total of £55,360 for an estimated total of 2,768 hours
Our priorities for next year:
- Reach out to people and communities who find it difficult to speak up for themselves. Particularly in 'End of Life' Care.
- Revisit services we have reviewed and check that our recommendations are being implemented and permanent improvements are in place.
- Strengthen advocacy services in the City particularly Independent Health Complaints Advocacy.
- Build community partnerships particularly with the Universities, Community Leaders and Housing organisations
- Help public and patient engagement in the plans to integrate Health and Social Care in the city.
- Work closer with Healthwatch in East and West Sussex - sharing skills and resources on:
- Improving A&E services
- Influencing NHS investment in Mental Health Services
- Assisting the NHS Review into Children and Young Peoples access to psychological therapies
Our plans for next year:
We will:
-
Publish annual reports on our Hospital Environmental Visits and Home Care visits
- Publish a 5 year review of NHS hospital PLACE reports for Brighton and Sussex Hospitals Trust and Sussex Partnerships Foundation Trust, the mental health Trust
- Re-visit A&E departments to check improvements have been made
- Check that the City wide plan to improve hospital discharge and community support has been implemented
- Complete and publish our review of every GP practice in the City
- Publish briefing papers on 'Sexual Health Services' and another on 'Improving NHS complaints processes'
- Review the system for booking outpatient appointments in Brighton and Hove
Young Healthwatch will continue to hold 'listening labs' all over the City and focus on:
- Young people affected by cancer
- Sexual Health
- Minority Communities
Downloads
You can download the report here. If you need it in a different format, please contact us at office@healthwatchbrightonandhove.co.uk or 01273 234 041.
