Long Term Plan West Yorkshire & Harrogate Report
Download (PDF 3.01 MB)Summary of report content
Five local Healthwatch contributed towards the West Yorkshire and Harrogate STP based report. This work was part of the NHS Long Term Plan (LTP) network-wide project. Overall, 1806 people were engaged with responses collected from both surveys and focus groups.
The findings of this report included people wanted support from the NHS and its partners to make it easier and affordable to keep fit and eat healthily. People want the NHS to provide easier access to appointments, mainly with their GP but also with hospitals. It was reported that mental health services need to be more accessible for people of all ages, with shorter waiting times and easier and quicker assessments. People want to see more of a focus on prevention of poor mental health through raising awareness around looking after your mental health and how to help yourself. However, having more than one condition often makes it harder to get initial support, especially if you have non-physical conditions. Respondents feel that ongoing support could be improved if it were made more reliable and personalised and if it recognised their emotional needs. Cancer services often provide effective communication, whereas mental health and autism services’ communications are often felt to be inadequate.
The reports is to be shared among local residents and the West Yorkshire and Harrogate Health and Care Partnership. A response from the Health and Care Partnership was included to outline the next steps.