Agenda item

Jaime Walsh, Director of Operations for Healthwatch and Engagement Services – Your Voice in Health and Social Care (“Director of Operations”) provided an update to the Sub-Committee regarding the Healthwatch Bromley Quarter 3 Patient Engagement Report.

The Director of Operations informed Members that over 400 reviews had been collated during the Quarter 3 period (October to December 2020) however, this was a shortfall compared to the usual quarterly target. There were several reasons for this, including staff changes and the continued restrictions around social distancing, but it was anticipated that target numbers would be reached during Quarter 4. The Director of Operations advised that nearly 75% of feedback received had been positive. It was noted that the trend being seen in Bromley was replicated in Healthwatch’s other boroughs, with a large increase in both 5-star and 1-star ratings. This was something that had changed over the last year with more 4-star ratings having been received pre-pandemic.

During Quarter 3, a number of comments had continued to be received relating to GP, pharmacy and dental services and it was highlighted that there had been a reduced number of comments relating to hospital services. This was unusual, although it had been a feature over the last year and was an area in which increased feedback was hoped for going forward. Feedback received relating to GPs had included positive comments regarding staff attitudes and quality of service, with more balanced and negative feedback connected to communications and waiting times. These same trends were replicated for pharmacy and dental services.

The Director of Operations said that the Patient Engagement Report had previously been presented to a several large meetings, however during the pandemic a number of these had been cancelled or changed frequency. Going forward, consideration would need to be given as to how discussions around the content of the report could be reinvigorated to ensure “Bromley voices” were heard and any impact or actions made clear. A Member suggested that the next Patient Engagement Report could include an indication of how things had changed over time – previously the overriding feature for negative comments had related to waiting times and it would be useful to see how this had changed over the course of the pandemic.

In response to a question, the Director of Operations advised that Healthwatch’s priority was to get back out into the community as quickly and as safely as they could. During the pandemic they had been required to undertake direct engagement via phone and online sessions. The main feature of the Patient Experience programme was to go and speak with people face to face and they were currently mapping out a return to this, as best they could, in line with the lifting of restrictions. It was a changing picture, but it was hoped that they would be able to reflect on what had happen pre-pandemic and how it had changed throughout the course of the last year. Discussions with providers, to ensure their data and statistics were triangulated with other patient experience data, would help form the “bigger picture”. The Member agreed that a joint piece of work with other providers would be beneficial particularly as an area of focus had been on the ‘hard to reach’ cohort, and it may now be even more difficult to engage with this group.

The Director of Operations confirmed that responses had been provided, relating to questions on the Quarter 1 and 2 Patient Experience Reports, received from the Co-opted Member representing Bromley Experts by Experience. It was agreed that a copy of the responses would be circulated to Members of the Sub-Committee. The Director of Operations noted that a new Healthwatch Bromley co-ordinator would be in post from the 1^st April 2021.

The Chairman thanked Jaime Walsh, Director of Operations for Healthwatch and Engagement Services – Your Voice in Health and Social Care for her update to the Sub-Committee.