Patient awareness of NHS medical services, Barnet
Download (PDF 642.87 KB)Summary of report content
In 2017, Healthwatch Barnet set out to explore awareness and use of different medical services available in Barnet. It was also an opportunity to ask residents how they would like to receive information about local services and to gather initial views on a leaflet that provides comprehensive information of the different medical services in Barnet and when to access them.
Healthwatch Barnet approached Millway Medical Practice as it is a practice with over 18,000 patients on their list and would provide a good number of Barnet residents to speak to.
The exercise showed that most people had heard of the range of different NHS services available to them with Walk-In Centres being the service with the highest awareness rate. 87% surveyed said that they were aware they could use the pharmacy for advice about minor medical problems and few had heard of NHS 111 service.
Most respondents said they would only use A&E for emergencies (not for normal medical advice and treatment), however there were 43 people who said they would go to A&E for non-emergencies. The data shows that that over half of those who said they would go to A&E for a non-urgent issue were aware of and had used at least two other services.
The report concluded that patient awareness of the different services was higher than their use and that this could be because participants had not needed to access the different services or that awareness does not guarantee use.
The report makes four recommendations which include developing campaigns to help the public to understand the correct use of NHS services and improve communications with patients around NHS changes.
It is unclear who the recommendations were aimed at as the report does not state where it has been shared or contain a response to the recommendations.