Long Term Plan Northumberland, Tyne and Wear and County Durham Report

This report contains the views of 1472 people gathered through a series of focus groups and surveys to help inform the implementation of the NHS Long Term Plan in the north east of England. The area covered is the North Integrated Care Partnership which forms part of the North East Integrated Care System. The report was produced on behalf of the 7 Healthwatch in the area by Healthwatch Darlington.

Overall the report highlights the challenges that people who live in the north eastern region face in relation to accessing services, largely attributed to geography, with people traveling large distances across rural areas to get the support they need. Transport and digital solutions are discussed frequently as being key solutions, however they do no not currently meet the needs of the people in the area. Throughout the report communication between people and health care practitioner as well as between services is cited as being key to quality care and delays in accessing services can lead to delays in receiving diagnosis. Healthwatch County Durham praised the collective efforts of the voluntary sector, the importance of which is a key theme throughout the report and across areas.

Healthwatch Newcastle and Healthwatch Gateshead looked at mental health with young people, identifying long waiting times and prevailing issues with stigma. Tailored services are needed as currently the support proffered can make people feel worse than better, for example care in the home or remote access to support for those who find it difficult to go out. Healthwatch South Tyneside also found that young people between the ages of 16 and 18 years fall into the gap between child and adult mental health services, which can be very confusing.

Healthwatch North Tyneside met with people to talk about cancer services which received high praise, emphasis was given to the importance of peer support before and after treatment and Healthwatch Northumberland suggested learning from how cancer services were delivered should be used to improve support for people with dementia. Poor information and lack of support post diagnosis is a key issue for people who have dementia in the area.

Healthwatch Sunderland explored the use of technology in improving access to services and found that there is still more to do while ensuring digital inclusion, a digital offer being part of the solution not all of it.