Healthwatch City of London March 2022 Bulletin

Last year Healthwatch City of London and Healthwatch Hackney undertook a project in collaboration with the Shoreditch Park and City Primary Care Network (PCN) to understand what residents want from their PCN. The Shoreditch Park and City PCN is the collective name for the group of local GP practices who have come together to focus on local patient care. This includes Shoreditch Park Surgery, De Beauvoir Surgery, Neaman Practice, Southgate Road and Whiston Road Surgeries, Hoxton Surgery, and Lawson Practice.

The PCN wanted to understand:
• What is and is not working well
• Where the community would like us to focus and improve
• What services the community would like to see develop in the future

A total of 1018 responses were obtained to questions on health services, accessibility, Covid-19, and health challenges and priorities. Ten focus groups were also held, with 38 patients, including Turkish-speakers, carers, and homeless communities.

Specifically in the City we obtained 278 responses, which equates to over 27% of responses across the whole patch. Three focus groups were held with City residents, totalling an attendance of 10 participants, including members of the homeless community.

Two reports were produced as a results of the survey and focus groups, a full report covering all responses from across the Shoreditch Park and City PCN, and a City specific report.

Overview of findings

• 74% of respondents were satisfied with the health services they received in the last year.
• Mental health services, physiotherapy, and health/wellbeing advisors are the services respondents most wanted to be made available in their respective GP surgeries.
• The top five health priorities of community members, ranked in order of priority, are: childhood obesity, adult obesity, drug misuse, alcohol misuse, and smoking cessation.
• 88.7% of respondents said they would be prepared to have a Covid-19 vaccination.
• Poor accessibility of health services to the elderly community and those with certain disabilities during the pandemic resulted from the online GP appointment booking process.
• Individuals reported consulting community pharmacists for medical advice with relative ease compared to their GP.
• There were two main contributors to public apprehension in using health services: fear of contracting Covid-19 and fear of burdening the system with comparatively minor issues.
• Almost all participants agreed that the Covid-19 pandemic and its consequences have taken a great mental toll on the community.
• For non-English speakers, the most identified problem in accessing health care was a communication barrier.

The main recommendations put forward in both reports are:

• Practices to review the systems used to book appointments to ensure it is accessible to all. Ensure practices are effectively communicating the booking process to patients (e.g. via receptionists or via website).
• Offer methods of contacting the GP surgeries other than via telephone, supporting patients’ desire for more online access and face to face appointments.
• Work in coordination with Public Health on programmes to address child and adult obesity.
• Encourage uptake of the Covid-19 vaccine by sharing relevant and up-to-date information and inviting questions, and addressing any concerns.
• Support parents whose children have been negatively affected by the pandemic by providing support, signposting to resources and referring to appropriate services.
• Evaluate the provision of interpretating services in GP Surgeries, focusing on the accessibility of interpreters.
• Respond to residents’ desire for mental health services, physiotherapy clinics, and health/wellbeing advisers in the GP surgeries.
• Ensure mental health and wellbeing services are well publicised to residents and help to ensure equity of access.
• Connect with the homeless population to raise their awareness of addiction-related services where relevant.

Please see below the full report for the Shoreditch Park and City PCN, the summary leaflet and the full City specific report.

We will closely monitor the progress of these recommendations and have invited the Health Inequalities lead for the PCN to update us at our next public meeting.