Deaf inclusion project enter and view reports
Download (PDF 464 KB)Summary of report content
13 Local Healthwatch across North, Central and East London have been working together on a project to improve deaf inclusion in their work and increase the involvement of London’s deaf community in the improvement of health and social care services in the capital. A key part of the project was recruiting and training volunteers from the deaf community and training them to be Authorised Representatives and mystery shoppers.
The British Deaf Association (BDA) was a key partner in helping recruit the volunteers. Once trained, the 9 volunteers conducted Enter and View Visits looking at deaf access and pathways through 3 London Emergency Departments; Queen’s Hospital Romford, University College London and Newham Hospital. Healthwatch Redbridge acted as the lead Healthwatch for all the visits and as a result, this report is published through them.
This Enter and View Report captures the findings and recommendations from the three visits. The findings from each hospital are presented separately, to ensure ease of access for each trust with summative conclusions and recommendations at the end of the report. NHS England has developed a new accessible information standard. The standard aims to ensure that, patients and service users, and where appropriate carers and parents, with information or communication support needs relating to a disability, impairment or sensory loss have those needs met by health and social care services and organisations.
The timing of our visits therefore had strategic importance in supporting the trusts to identify the challenges deaf patients experience in accessing services and provide solutions and improvements. A secondary aim of the visits was to support London NHS Trusts ensure compliance with The Equality Delivery System (EDSII) launched in July 2011. It is a system that helps NHS organisations improve the services they provide for their local communities and provide better working environments, free of discrimination, for those who work in the NHS, while meeting the requirements of the Equality Act 2010.