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Healthwatch Southampton 2
Healthwatch Your Area Annual Report 2016/17....................................................................... 2
Contents ...................................................................................................................................... 2
Message from our Chair ............................................................................................................ 3
Highlights from our year ............................................................................................................ 5
Who we are ................................................................................................................................. 6
Your views on health and care .................................................................................................. 7
Helping you find the answers ................................................................................................ 10
Making a difference together ................................................................................................. 12
It starts with you ....................................................................................................................... 21
Our Plans for next year ............................................................................................................ 22
Our people ................................................................................................................................ 23
Our finances ............................................................................................................................. 24
Contact us ................................................................................................................................. 25
Healthwatch Southampton 3
The City, like many others, also faces the
problems of a funding shortage in the
Health and social care sector.
According to the Multiple index of deprivation
2015, the City now ranks 67th worst (out of
326) and shows a worsening position from
2010 when it was 81st. This widening social
inequality was highlighted in a report to
Council by the Cabinet member for Health
and sustainable living.
It is regrettable that a boy born in one part of
Southampton will have a life expectancy 10
years less than a girl born in another and
that it is estimated that over 100 people die
because of winter. Mental health in the City
is a major problem and the latest figures
show that Southampton had the 4th highest
suicide rate amongst the 150 upper-tier
English local authorities.
It is worth repeating, that Healthwatch
Southampton is disproportionally busy for its
size, as the City has a very large Regional
specialist teaching hospital. It is also the
headquarters of a community trust that
serves Southampton, Portsmouth, and large
parts of southern Hampshire. In addition, we
have a large mental health hospital in the
City.
These factors combine to mean that the year
has been another busy one for Healthwatch
Southampton and we have continued to
engage with NHS and social care bodies.
Community engagement continues to be a
most important part of our activity and our
community team has been very active,
attending meetings of voluntary sector
groups and statutory organisations, meeting
hundreds of local people at community
events across the City and I congratulate
them for their continued efforts. You can
read more detail later in this report
As in previous years we have committed to
assist with PLACE (Patient Led Assessment
of the Care Environment) inspections for all
premises that provide in-patient services for
NHS patients. Similarly, we have exercised
our responsibility to comment on the quality
accounts of University Hospital Southampton
FT, Solent NHS Trust and Southern Health
FT.
During the year there was a major national
concern affecting one of the trusts that we
deal with and as Healthwatch Southampton
is firmly established as a point of contact for
many sections of the media we were asked
for and provided comment.
When the local Sustainability and
Transformation Plan (STP) was announced,
we were initially criticised for being slow to
provide our reaction to it.
Healthwatch Southampton 4
Details are now on our website and we have
allied with other Healthwatch organisations
in Wessex, and are working with the
communications lead for the Hampshire and
Isle of Wight STP, to encourage better
communication and engagement with the
public.
This report includes a lot of information
regarding our ongoing work program and
lists many achievements. One of the many
examples of good work is our involvement
with the local acute trust to improve the
information available to patients and to
improve the way that they communicate with
patients and the public with sensory
impairment. This work has made good
progress and details can be found in the
report.
Although a few days past the year end in
question, I am pleased to report that our
annual General meeting was a great
success. It was attended by approximately
80 people with the CCG and each of the
providers represented. As well as producing
the usual report we arranged a presentation
by Roy Lilley who was, as expected,
controversial in places. There is no doubt
that the public enjoyed it and at the closing
round table discussion we asked members
to provide questions to be put before the
authorities. 30 different questions were
logged and submitted. Each of them was
answered and the responses appeared on
our website.
I would like to take this opportunity to thank
members of the Strategy group for their
dedication and commitment. I would also
like to thank the Healthwatch manager and
his small but dedicated team for their
conscientious efforts on behalf of the citizens
of the City.
I believe this report will give you a flavour of
our varied activities and I look forward to the
next year which again promises to be a very
challenging time for both health and social
care in the City.
Harry Dymond Harry Dymond, MBE
Healthwatch Southampton Chairperson
Healthwatch Southampton 5
Healthwatch Southampton 6
Established in 2013 we have been working
hard to improve patient and public voice and
ensure services are listening and responding
to our needs and ideas for improvement.
Healthwatch Southampton has three main
aims:
To be an independent, influential and
effective voice for the public
To provide an information, advice and
signposting service
To provide independent health (NHS)
complaints advocacy
Healthwatch Southampton is made up of
individuals and community groups who work
together to improve local services. We have
a membership which is open to any
interested person or group to join. Members
are kept up-to-date with our activities and
opportunities to get involved and elect the
public members of the Healthwatch
Southampton Strategic Group which steers
our work.
Healthwatch Southampton relies on your
views and experiences of health and social
care services. We actively seek these in
many ways – through surveys, community
engagement and our online feedback centre.
With this information we can then seek
change either directly for individuals or for
affected groups. We are recognised by
health and social care services and have a
track-record in getting change and
improvement.
We are committed to regularly making
reports and recommendations about how
local care services could or ought to be
improved. These are directed to
commissioners and providers of care
services, and shared with Healthwatch
England as well as being made available to
the public.
Having undertaken in depth engagement
over a six month period we held a half day
meeting in the summer with HWS Strategic
Group to reprioritise our strategic themes.
These are the areas where we have focused
considerable attention over the last year:
Social Care
Primary Care
Mental Health
If you have ideas about what we should
focus on we would love to hear from you.
Healthwatch Southampton 7
This is done primarily through face to face
contact, outreach events and meetings with
groups in the voluntary, statutory and
educational sectors. In this section we break
down some of the people we’ve visited
and/or worked with this year:
As part of our continuing efforts to engage
with diverse groups and communities, the
majority of our engagement has been
targeted towards those considered to have
‘seldom-heard’ voices.
We co-produced a qualitative study into
the experiences of local people living
with mental health conditions alongside
the University of Southampton. Based on
this study, we received a grant from NHS
England to create a short animation.
We’re working with Southern Health NHS
Foundation Trust and the Mental Health
Partnership to help develop a service
user group forum.
We attended 3 Mentally Healthy
Southampton meetings and through that
helped to organise a Mentally Healthy
workshop that was attended by 50
people.
We attended a series of anti-stigma
planning meetings and engagement
events
We led PLACE inspections at mental
health facilities Forest Lodge and
Antelope House.
We helped plan and organise ‘Keeping
the Hope Day’ as part of World Suicide
Prevention Day.
Working alongside young people from
the National Citizenship Scheme, we
spoke to over 150 young people whilst
co-producing a Youth Healthcare
Questionnaire.
We attended City College Southampton’s
LGBT and Sexual Health Awareness
Healthwatch Southampton 8
Event and conducted a sexual health
survey.
We visited No Limits Teen Safe House
and forwarded young people’s
experiences of mental health to No Limits
and the NHS
Following our work on reducing barriers
to GP registration, we produced a
Registering with a GP Report that was
used as the basis for a series of regional
reports. We also created a short film to
continue to bring awareness to this issue.
As a means of reaching out to our
diverse local community we appeared on
Awaaz FM twice and Unity 101
Community Hour once.
We had a stall at Mela Festival and
collected patient experiences for our
Feedback Centre.
We helped to ensure Consult and
Challenge was able to continue operating
and relocate following the end of its
funding.
We were invited by the Homeless
Healthcare Team to attend three
outreach sessions and conduct some
service user feedback.
We supported the launch of Dementia
Friends Southampton, speaking at their
launch.
We helped establish Let’s Loop, a group
that aims to improve access to hearing
loops in the City.
We were aware that there are individuals
that live outside of our remit (SO14-19)
but use services within this area. To help
ensure we reached those individuals, we
carried out a series of engagement
events at Southampton General Hospital.
Throughout 2016 we asked over 350 people
for ‘One change that would improve my
health.’ Responses varied with a particular
focus on the need to exercise more and eat
healthier.
A significant amount of the public noted their
desire for more gym/swimming facilities and
an overall improvement of NHS services.
As part of our website redesign, we launched our Feedback Centre in 2016 that enables people to leave feedback about local health and care services. The public are able to leave their reviews anonymously which are then moderated to make sure they are appropriate. This feedback has enabled us to work with local service providers to advocate for changes and improvements and to champion the success stories we hear about. To date, almost 200 people have left feedback through our website and through engagement events.
Healthwatch Southampton 9
Healthwatch Southampton, regards Patient
Led Assessments of the Care Environment
(PLACE) assessments as an important part
of our work.
These assessments require local people go
into hospitals as part of teams to assess
how the environment supports patient’s
privacy and dignity, food, cleanliness, and
general building maintenance.
Members of Healthwatch Southampton have
been involved in this process assessing all
buildings and wards run by NHS and private
providers that cater for NHS patients.
We have noted this year that some
organisations have not applied the ‘rules’ of
PLACE as they should. Examples include
allowing the date to become known, NHS
staff attempting to excuse problems,
Healthwatch not called as the lead provider
of patient representatives, etc. As a result,
we intend to write a general note to all
providers reminding them what is expected
from a PLACE inspection to avoid a
repetition next year.
Despite these concerns the inspection
process has been successful and small but
important changes have resulted. In one
case, a fairly major concern led to the
provider making internal enquiries to rectify
the situation. NHS England will publish these
results later in the year.
Over the past year we carried out PLACE
Inspections at the following locations:
Princess Anne Hospital
Southampton General Hospital
Countess Mountbatten House
The Western Hospital
Royal South Hants Hospital
The Southampton Treatment Centre
(Care UK)
The Spire Hospital
Antelope House
Forest Lodge
Healthwatch Southampton 10
This service is provided over the phone,
through email and sometimes face-to-face.
The reach of this service is extended
through a contract we have in place with
Southampton CAB, and through a directory
of services on the Healthwatch Southampton
website, were the public can also leave
reviews of local services and see what other
people are saying.
Over the last year we have assisted in 227
enquiries to our information service. The
nature of these enquiries is shown in the
pie chart (right):
Of these enquiries:
17% were requests for information.
10% were raising concerns.
73% were complaining about some
aspect of care.
Where people have wanted assistance in
making a complaint we refer to SeAp, who
provide independent health complaints
advocacy. However, this service does not
extend to social care complaints. Where the
problem is regarding social care, the team
are able to signpost to other local
organisations who may be able to help, and
if none exist we often spend a considerable
amount of time liaising with social care staff
to help find a solution.
Social care (66) General enquries (65)
Hospital services (28) GP (26)
Other services (14) mental health (10)
Dentistry (7) Ambulance (3)
Children's services (3) Care homes (2)
Pharmacy (1) Outpatients (1)
Finance (1)
Healthwatch Southampton 11
Mrs B contacted us regarding a delay in an
ambulance reaching her partner who was
seriously unwell and who subsequently died.
She initially contacted 111 and the concern
was over the time delay in the call being
triaged and the ambulance arriving.
Healthwatch Southampton contacted South
Central Ambulance Service (SCAS) on her
behalf who investigated the call and spoke
to Mrs B to discuss what happened and
what lessons could be learned.
Mr P, an 80 year old man, called our
information line from Southampton General
Hospital, where he said he was being held
against his will under the Mental Capacity
Act. The Healthwatch Southampton worker
contacted the Deprivation of Liberty
Safeguarding (DoLS) lead at Southampton
City Council to raise this as an urgent
concern. Local organisation Solent Mind,
who provide Independent Mental Capacity
Advocates (IMCA), were also informed.
Subsequently the advocates were able to
visit Mr P in hospital and the Mental
Capacity Act ruling was revisited. Mr P was
safely discharged home the following day.
Mrs K contacted us regarding the delay in
getting support boots which have to be
specially made for her. The company in
question had made errors and mistakes and
she was in severe day-to-day pain without
the boots. Healthwatch Southampton
contacted the company and local
commissioners to highlight failings in the
supply chain. Eventually the correct boots
were reordered and arrived.
Healthwatch Southampton 12
Our investigations have enabled us to shine
a light on areas of best practice locally, and
also show were things need improving.
Through our relationships with local
providers and commissioners of services we
are able to use your views and experiences
to influence and improve local health and
care services.
Over the course of the year Healthwatch
Southampton has published 15 reports,
which are available on our website, and
the highlights are briefly described
below.
Ladies Walk and Midanbury Surgeries
As part of this work we held a series of
engagement events at Ladies Walk &
Midanbury Surgeries, surveying a total of 50
patients during 3 engagement events
throughout February – April 2017. Overall,
feedback about the surgeries was positive,
however a number of areas were raised as
needing improvement including appointment
waiting times, continuity of care and
accessibility of the premises. The practice
manager responded to HWS with
improvements they are planning to make.
Homeless Healthcare Team
Healthwatch Southampton was invited by
the Homeless Healthcare Team to conduct a
survey around patient experience. We spoke
to 36 clients during this time and asked them
a series of questions. The patients that we
surveyed were extremely positive about the
service provided by the Homeless
Healthcare Team. Generally speaking,
appointments were easier to get, lasted
longer than an average GP appointment,
and patients said they felt more listened to
than with other GP practices in the city.
Overall, the vast majority of patients
surveyed stated that they did not believe that
the service provided by Homeless
Healthcare Team needed improvement,
which is clear sign of the quality of the
service on offer.
NIcholstown Surgery
In November 2016 HWS worked with
Nicholstown Surgery to undertake a survey
of patients focused on their experience of
booking appointments. We spoke to 30
patients and prepared a report which was
shared with the surgery and the Patient
Participation Group (PPG). It highlighted
that the majority of patients surveyed contact
the surgery by telephone but can find it
difficult to get through and can sometimes
Healthwatch Southampton 13
get cut off. Having got through people we
surveyed were generally satisfied with
explaining their condition over the telephone,
but getting to speak to a member of staff
initially was the main problem. We raised
this with the surgery at their Patient
Participation Group who are aware of the
problem and are working to address this.
Registering with a GP Practice
During a number of Healthwatch outreach
sessions in 2015, individuals and groups
raised with us the issue of not being able to
register at GP practices due to not having
the required photo ID and/or proof of
address. As this was a national issue, we
took the matter to NHS England and other
organisations including the Equalities and
Human Rights Commission. With this effort
new national guidance was put in place.
Following on from this work, Healthwatch
Southampton conducted a ‘mystery shopper’
exercise contacting GP practices (including
branches and the Homeless Healthcare
Team) in Southampton to ask what they
required, if anything, from patients when
registering. Our intention was to discover
what practices had amended their
registration policy to reflect the amended
national guidance.
Although Healthwatch Southampton was
successful in advocating for a change in
national guidance, it’s evident that the
majority of practices in Southampton are
either not aware of the amendment in policy
or have not implemented it. When
telephoning, 71% of practices required some
sort of proof of identification or address
before a patient could be registered. 68% of
practice websites contain outdated content
that mentions requiring proof of identification
or address before a patient could be
registered.
Although practices are allowed to request
proof of address and/or photo ID, all staff
must be made aware that they should not
refuse registration if a patient cannot or will
not provide ID. Healthwatch Southampton
recommends that all practice staff including
doctors and front-of-house staff need to
receive training to reflect the amended
national guidance that came into effect in
November 2015 which states that::
We are concerned that by asking for
identification some patients may be
incorrectly assuming that it is compulsory to
provide identification when it is not. This
could result in vulnerable individuals being
excluded from receiving the care that they
are entitled to. HWS is now working with
Wessex Local Medical Committee (LMC), to
Healthwatch Southampton 14
design training to practices around this
issue.
PPG Network
Through our work we realised there were
discrepancies’ in how GP Patient
Participation Groups (PPG) were operated.
We therefore undertook an audit of PPGs so
we could better understand the landscape.
Some primary care service providers were
running regular PPG meetings, others had
yearly online forums or surveys and some
service providers had no form of PPG at all.
Healthwatch Southampton believes it would
be beneficial to form a PPG network, which
links PPGs across Southampton. Following
discussions with Southampton City Clinical
Commissioning Group (SCCCG) we are
planning to work in partnership to form a
network that will aid in sharing best practice,
provide peer-to-peer support and enable the
gathering of patient opinion across the city.
Follow up on the closure of Bitterne
Walk-in-Centre
Last year we reported on the consultation
process leading to the closure of the Bitterne
walk-in-centre. We stated that we would
examine the effect of this closure carefully
and raise any concerns with the CCG.
Approximately a year after its closure, we
asked the Acute Trust for attendance figures
at the Emergency Department broken down
by postcode. We were obviously concerned
to see if the closure had resulted in more
patients from the East of the City using ED
because of the closure. The figures
demonstrated very clearly that there had
been no increase in attendance at the ED.
We also asked for attendance figures at the
Minor Injuries unit. These show a very
significant increase of patients using the
minor injuries unit both for minor injuries but
also for minor illnesses.
The conclusion from these two sets of
figures is that Patients are making good use
of the minor injuries unit and there is no
increase in the use of ED.
Young People’s Survey
Over the summer of 2016 Healthwatch
Southampton worked with a team of young
people taking part in the National Citizenship
Scheme (NCS) to co-produce a health
questionnaire. We felt that the voice of
young people was not being heard enough
within health and social care and the
questionnaire offered an opportunity to
address this. Working with the NCS
Volunteers we surveyed over 150 young
people aged mostly 16 and 17.
The results show that the young people
surveyed identify stress is as the main thing
preventing them from being healthy.
Combined with this young people highlight
the need for better access and
improvements to mental health services.
The replies relating to mental health stand
out from this questionnaire and Healthwatch
Southampton would therefore recommend
that mental health services locally look at
their provision for young people in
Healthwatch Southampton 15
Southampton, in particular to 16-17 year
olds.
With high levels of stress being reported by
young people this clearly is a significant
health problem which is perhaps under-
recognised. As such, we would also
recommend that further research is carried
out which focusses on stress in young
people and looks at the causes and ways in
which it can be reduced.
The report has been shared locally with
commissioners and providers of young
people’s services, to feed into the design of
future service provision.
Young People’s Sexual Health Survey
In February 2017 Healthwatch Southampton
attended City College Southampton’s LGBT
and Sexual Health Awareness Event. As
part of that event, we conducted a survey,
asking 24 students between the ages of 16-
19 to self-assess their level of education of
sexual health, who they’d contact for help
and advice about sexual health and whether
they’d ever experienced unwanted sexual
activity of some kind.
Young people surveyed said that they would
primarily contact their GP for help and
advice about sexual health, followed by the
GUM clinic and family. Over half of
respondents said that their level of sexual
health education is good but a third said
their sexual health education was ok, low or
very low. 9 young people out of 24 had
experienced unwanted sexual activity of
some kind which demonstrates that this is
an important issue that needs greater
awareness and research to ensure support
is available.
Of those who had reported unwanted sexual
activity, two young people had not then let
someone know or reported this. On the day
they were directed to the PIPPA (Prevention,
Intervention and Public Protection Alliance)
stand which is an alliance group of specialist
sexual and domestic violence services in
Southampton, working to end domestic and
sexual violence and abuse.
Southampton General Hospital -
University Hospitals Southampton
Foundation Trust (UHS FT)
University Hospital Southampton Foundation
Trust is responsible for the Southampton
General; Hospital which is a major Regional
teaching and research hospital and accepts
patients from a very wide area including the
Chanel Islands and even the Falkland
Islands. The population covered for
specialist services is approximately 3.7
Healthwatch Southampton 16
million. With a staff of about 10,500 they
treat some 150,000 in-patients and day
patients per annum. In addition it is
responsible for the Princess Anne Hospital
which is a centre of excellence for maternity
care and a regional centre for foetal and
maternal medicine; the New Forest Birthing
Centre and the Countess Mountbatten
Hospice, a regional NHS palliative care
service.
Last year we reported on the ‘Clinical
Accreditation Scheme’, which involves lay
members, including Healthwatch members,
in assessing the care provided in an
individual ward or outpatient clinic.
Members of the team make an
unannounced visit to the Ward/clinic and
using a pre-set template evaluate the ward
using a process known as the ‘fifteen-step
challenge’, or ‘understanding quality from a
patient’s perspective’. This is followed by a
formal interview with senior members of the
ward/department who are required to
produce statistics and evidence across a
range of issues. Although not Enter and
View, the feedback from these inspections is
just as valuable. Healthwatch can suggest
an inspection of a given ward or department
and the evidence is used to support our
case for improved service. Any serious
concerns are raised directly with the Director
of Nursing and/or the Medical Director.
In December, we conducted a survey of
patients at the hospital and found a very
high degree of satisfaction but with 3 issues
that patients and visitors told us required
improvement:
Car parking
Smoking near the main entrance
State of some public toilets
These issues were raised with the
management and as a result the
management acknowledged the difficulties
with car parking and although increased car
parking is planned to open later this year,
they undertook several additional significant
changes to improve the situation in the short
term: Greater emphasis has now been
placed in directing patients to the designated
smoking shelters and staff have been
reminded of the Trust’s non-smoking policy:
Improvements have been made to the toilets
near the entrance and notices have been
displayed directing people to alternative
facilities.
Do Not Attempt Cardio Pulmonary
Resuscitation (DNACPR)
Healthwatch Southampton questioned
University Hospitals Southampton NHS
Foundation Trust (UHS) about its policy and
practice in relation to ‘Do Not Attempt Cardio
Pulmonary Resuscitation’ (DNACPR). We
also undertook a survey with our members
about DNACPR.
Our survey showed very clearly that the
majority of respondents favoured a
discussion on DNACPR occurring at the
earliest opportunity with several suggesting
that GPs could be more involved thus
limiting the incidence of discussion at a
critical stage. UHS agreed this was an
important point and undertook to make this
view more widely known with consultants
Healthwatch Southampton 17
and to consider how this view could be
better incorporated into future training
programmes.
Improving the experience of patients with
sensory disability
Last year we reported on cooperation with
UHS on a project to implement the
Accessible Information Standard for people
with sensory impairment. Great progress
has been made and an ‘assistance required’
card is to be widely advertised and made
available to all hospital patients that have a
sensory impairment. On production of this
card the hospital will log the assistance
required on the patient’s medical records
and provide the assistance needed. The
card will also serve if a patient needs an
interpreter. We have helped the Trust
develop a policy for assistance dogs
including the provision of a dedicated space
for the dog to relieve itself. We conducted
an audit of the available hearing loops in the
hospitals run by the Trust and concluded
that there were insufficient and some of
those that were installed were either not
working or were not understood by staff
responsible for them. As a result of the
report, the Deputy Director of estates was
tasked with producing an action plan to
rectify the situation. Healthwatch was
consulted on its content and has been
invited to monitor progress. Part of the plan
includes the decision to install a hearing loop
whenever an area is refurbished.
We have continued to inspect the number
and quality of patient information leaflets to
ensure that essential patient information is
readily available and not lost in a plethora of
other less important information. The Trust
had agreed that patients who require it can
have leaflets in a colour and typeface
suitable for those with sight loss. Several
leaflets can now be made available in Braille
and alternative languages.
Royal South Hants
Healthwatch Southampton spent a day at
Royal South Hants Hospital in November
2016. We were there to promote
Healthwatch and engage with the public
around experiences of health services. We
asked people two questions:
How is your experience of the health
services at the RSH today?
Is there anything you would like to see
improved?
Feedback was very positive on the whole,
although a couple of issues were raised,
including regret at the loss of the Healthy
Bite Cafe, and the parking machine not
taking the new £5 notes. This information
was passed onto the Site Services Manager
and the GU clinic was informed about the
request for a drop-in service.
Southern Health NHS Foundation Trust
The media was full of adverse stories about
the perceived failings of Southern Health
NHS FT following a damning report from
Mazars into the deaths of people with a
Learning Disability or Mental Health problem
in contact with them. They also had a
warning notice from the CQC.
Southern Health NHS FT runs inpatient
acute service providing treatment and care
for people who have severe mental illness
and need their treatment delivered in an
inpatient setting in Southampton at Antelope
House.
Naturally, Healthwatch Southampton was
extremely concerned and requested an
urgent meeting with its management. In
order to maximise the value of the meeting
Healthwatch Southampton 18
we presented the Trust with a number of
searching questions and comments prior to
the meeting. The meeting was attended by
Julie Dawes who had just taken up the post
of Interim Chief Executive following the
decision of the previous Chief Executive to
stand down. She was accompanied by the
Director of Operations, mental health,
learning disability and social care; the Area
Manager Southampton, Adult Mental Health;
and the Communications manager. The
meeting was very candid and the
representatives of the Trust were very frank
in their response. It was clear that the new
Chief Executive had grasped the urgency of
the situation. Reassured by the responses
from the Trust management, Healthwatch
Southampton made it clear that, although
being critical of recent events at Southern
Health, we needed them to succeed and
would act as a critical friend to do what we
could to improve services within
Southampton and where appropriate help
them to restore public confidence. The
previous Chief Executive resigned two days
after this meeting.
One of the unfortunate consequences of this
adverse publicity was that the Trust
struggled to recruit and retain trained nurses
to the extent that they were concerned that
they could no longer sustain a safe
environment for the Psychiatric Intensive
Care Unit at Antelope House. This implied
moving patients to another facility in London
not run by Southern Health. Healthwatch
Southampton were consulted and sought
assurances that any closure would be
temporary, that Southern Health would
maintain continuity of care of patients and
that patient relatives would receive help to
visit. Having received these assurances,
Healthwatch Southampton supported the
decision on the grounds of patient safety.
We are pleased to report that following a
restructuring of staff, the unit at
Southampton has now re-opened. Whilst
there is still room for improvement, we were
also pleased that a subsequent inspection
by the CQC removed the warning notice and
gave Southern Health an overall rating of
‘requires improvement’ with ‘caring’ and
‘responsive’ rated as good.
Throughout its work Healthwatch
Southampton works closely with a variety of
organisations. This includes local
commissioning through Southampton City
Council and Southampton City Clinical
Healthwatch Southampton 19
Commissioning Group, local NHS trusts and
private sector organisations involved in the
delivery of services, Social Care services,
Public Health, and a vast range of voluntary,
community and social enterprise
organisations as discussed elsewhere in this
report.Healthwatch Southampton has
collaborated with neighbouring local
Healthwatches across the Wessex footprint
and NHS England (Wessex) to form
“Wessex Voices”, which is enabling patients
and the public to get involved in
commissioning undertaken by NHS England,
and to feed into strategy being developed by
Wessex Clinical Senate. We are looking
forward to building on our successes over
the next year.
Through the Healthwatch Network we have
been able to feed back issues of concern to
Healthwatch England, who can monitor
issues from the network at a national level.
In particular we have communicated our
concerns around barriers to accessing GP
care by registration policies which ask for
two forms of ID, including photo ID. The
Wessex local Healthwatches hold regular
meetings with our Healthwatch England
contact, where we are able to discuss issues
that are affecting the Wessex region, and
gain a better understanding of the impact of
national policy decisions. This has been
particularly helpful in preparing our
responses to the development of the
Sustainability and Transformation Plans
(STP). We continue to have a working
relationship with our local CQC
representatives, who invite our feedback
when undertaking inspections of local health
and care provision. By being included in
Quality Summits with local trusts post
inspection we are better able to understand
the issues raised through inspections and
the steps that are being taken to improve the
quality of services. This relationship also
enables us to represent the views of the
public and patients.
A key relationship we have formed over the
last two years has been with the Wessex
Local Medical Committees (LMC). LMCs act
as the support and advisory body to GP
practices, and their assistance in tackling the
issues around registering at a GP practice
has been invaluable.
Healthwatch Southampton 20
How we’ve worked with our
community
Healthwatch Southampton’s Strategic Group
is made up of local people who are elected
to represent the public and local voluntary
and community sector organisations. The
Strategic Group set the priorities for HWS,
with input from the public.
As well as guiding the direction of HWS, the
Strategic Group take on specific roles in
acting as leads within key areas of the local
health and care system. This includes
representation onto the Health Overview and
Scrutiny Panel (HOSP), linking with the
CCG, where we have a non-voting
representative on the CCG Board, linking
with the main NHS trusts and the Social
Care.
Strategic Group members are supported by
HWS Chair and staff to have input into these
structures. The healthwatch manager is
currently the HWS representative, with
voting rights, on the Southampton Health
and Wellbeing Board.
Healthwatch Southampton involves
volunteers in all aspects of its delivery. This
includes our community outreach team, a
media tracker, website volunteer and admin
and data entry.
Healthwatch Southampton 21
Following engagement work Healthwatch
Southampton became aware that many local
people were unhappy about the mental
health services they were receiving in
Southampton. Coupled with this people felt
they weren’t being listened to about the
design and delivery of local services.
We spoke to our membership about this
issue and through this the HWS Strategic
Group decided it should be one of our
priorities to find out more about the
experiences of this group of people.
Healthwatch Southampton went on to work
closely with the University of Southampton
to co-produce a piece of qualitative research
exploring people’s experiences of living in
Southampton with a mental health problem.
The work was guided by a steering group
that included people with lived experience
and their carers, as well as other local
stakeholders.
The research findings highlighted an over
reliance on medication, poor choice
concerning talking therapies, and a criticism
of the medical model of mental health. In
terms of recovery participants emphasised
the importance of occupation, in terms of
employment, volunteering and hobbies.
HWS was successful in securing a grant
from NHS England to produce a short
animated film, developed with a student from
London Metropolitan University, to highlight
the themes raised through the research.
Research participants were involved in a
series of workshops to shape the films
narrative and messages. Direct quotes were
taken from the interview transcripts to
powerfully illustrate the research themes.
This research is feeding into the local
commissioning of mental health services,
and HWS are subsequently working with
service users to develop a model of service
user representation to ensure their voices
are listened to in the local decision making
process in future.
Healthwatch Southampton 22
Following extensive public consultation and
a priority setting exercise led by the HWS
Strategic Group using a weighted priority
setting matrix we have set the following
areas of priority:
Mental Health Services
Primary Care – GP Services
Social Care Services
Integration and Transformation (golden
thread)
Whilst HWS has undertaken considerable
work concerning the first two priorities, as
outlined in this report, we are now setting a
programme of work for Social Care, which
will be reported on next year.
Given the level of change within health and
care services, the HWS Strategic Group also
set a fourth priority, or “golden thread”, of
Integration and Transformation. Our plan
over the next period is to work closely with
commissioners and health and care
providers to ensure that public engagement
and communication is successful in the
transformation agenda.
As stated in the Chair’s introduction, we
believe that in order for this to happen a
shared narrative needs to be developed with
the public, to better understand the
pressures facing the care system, and to
lend context to any changes in service
delivery that are being designed.
Healthwatch Southampton 23
Healthwatch Southampton Strategic Group
comprises of volunteer elected members
from both the public and voluntary sector
membership. Elections are held each year,
prior to the AGM, with 2/3rd of the
members standing down. Two further
members are appointed to make up skills
and equalities mix, with a final member
appointed by Southampton Voluntary
Services (SVS) as a link to the overarching
organisational governance of the contract
holding organisation. The election and
appointments of HWS Strategic Group is
overseen by an Independent Nominations
Committee, ensuring independence and
transparency in the election and selection
process.
HWS Strategic Group oversee the strategic
priority setting for each future period.
Priorities are set following extensive public
engagement. Decisions are made using a
weighted, priority matrix that enables the
members to analysis where HWS efforts are
best placed and therefore gain the
maximum impact with the resources
available.
The HWS Strategic Group meets monthly,
rotating between informal meetings and
meetings held in public.
Harry Dymond, MBE – Chairperson and
Public Member
Jo Ash, CBE - SVS Member
Paula Barnes – Skills and Equalities
Steve Beal – VCS
Anno Cato – Public Member
Lesley Gilder – Public Member
Annabel Hodgson - VCS
Jane Barnes
Graham Hunt
Matthew King
Sally Yan
Connor Burgg
Irene Warrican
Rob Kurn - Manager
Sam Goold – Community Engagement
Worker (left 2/6/17)
Ben Grace – Digital Engagement Worker
Healthwatch Southampton 24
Income £
Funding received from local authority to deliver local
Healthwatch statutory activities £125,000
Funding received from local authority to deliver
Independent Health Complaints Advocacy £50,000
Wessex Voices £1,277
Community Grant £1,000
Total income £177,277
Expenditure
Healthwatch operational costs £44,817
Healthwatch staffing costs £90,483
Healthwatch office costs £24,560
Total expenditure for delivery of Healthwatch statutory
activities £159,860
seAp subcontract to deliver Independent Health
Complaints Advocacy £50,000
Total combined expenditure £209,860
Reserves BFWD £88,458
Reserves CFWD £55,873
Healthwatch Southampton 25
Healthwatch Southampton
Southampton Voluntary Services
Kingsland Square
Southampton
SO14 1NW
Get in touch
Phone number: 02380216018
Email:[email protected]
Website:Healthwatchsouthampton.co.uk
Twitter: @HWSouthampton
seAp Southampton
Oasis The Venue,
Arundel Street,
Portsmouth
PO1 1NP
Southampton Citizens Advice
3 Kings Park Road
Southampton
Hampshire
SO15 2AT
We will be making this annual report publicly available on 30 June 2017 by publishing it on our
website and sharing it with Healthwatch England, CQC, NHS England, Clinical Commissioning
Group/s, Overview and Scrutiny Committee/s, and our local authority.
We confirm that we are using the Healthwatch Trademark (which covers the logo and
Healthwatch brand) when undertaking work on our statutory activities as covered by the
licence agreement.
If you require this report in an alternative format please contact us at the address above.
© Copyright Healthwatch Southampton, 2017
Healthwatch Southampton 26
Healthwatch Southampton
Southampton Voluntary Services
Kingsland Square
Southampton
SO14 1NW
w: www.healthwatchsouthampton.co.uk
t:02380216018
tw: @HWSouthampton
fb: facebook.com/SouthamptonHW