News and reports

Birmingham and Midland Eye Centre is one of the largest tertiary level facility of its kind in Europe which provides expertise in clinical care, research and education. It is based at City Hospital in Birmingham and is part of the Sandwell and West Birmingham NHS Trust. It receives referrals from hospitals and GPs across the region.
It offers a comprehensive set of services including ophthalmology Accident and Emergency, diagnostics, day surgery and outpatients, as well as housing administrative and educational facilities – all services :
https://bmec.swbh.nhs.uk/services/

Take a look at this months Insight Report, which will give you a snap shot of what our team have been doing during July.

Diabetes clinic at Sandwell General Hospital gives patients the chance to meet a range of different members of staff who have specialised and have years of experience looking after people with diabetes who can check that they are as healthy as possible and give them highly specialised advice on how to look after their diabetes. Most referrals come via the GP.

Healthwatch Sandwell are aware the challenges people facing regarding getting GP appointments, especially during the pandemic. We would like to capture the other side of GP surgeries, what are surgeries doing to improve the patient experience?

This will help:

• Inform patients about improvements the surgeries are making

• Build relationships with Practice Managers and Patient Participation Groups (PPG)

• Promote PPGs

Healthwatch Sandwell is your local health and social care champion. We make sure NHS leaders and decision makers hear your voice and use your feedback to improve care. We can also help you to find reliable and trustworthy information and advice.

Over the past year we have published 22 reports, engaged with 2,043 people and visited six towns of Sandwell delivering our Guided By You workshops.

Information for our Health Advisory Board Meeting to be held 4th July 2023.

An overview of the findings of Enter and View visits that took place between January 2022 and March 2023.

Healthwatch Sandwell is your independent consumer champion for health and social care services in Sandwell. Our job is to champion the consumer interests of those using the services and give local people an opportunity to speak out about their concerns. We listen to views, concerns, and compliments about services to help shape and improve them so that people are accessing the most quality and appropriate care.

NHS health and social care services care are legally required to follow the Accessible Information Standard 2016. This includes doctors, dentists, hospitals, pharmacies and social workers.

The Standard sets out a specific, consistent approach to identifying, recording, flagging, sharing and meeting the information and communication support needs of patients, service users, carers and parents with a disability, impairment or sensory loss.

Healthwatch Sandwell have explored with people with disabilities, sensory loss, or impairments whether health and social care services are meeting their information and communication needs as required under the Accessible Information Standard 2016.

Healthwatch Sandwell listen to what people say about their health and care services.
We tell health and care services what people said and how they can make things better.

NHS health and social care services care are legally required to follow the Accessible Information Standard 2016. This includes doctors, dentists, hospitals, pharmacies and social workers. The Standard sets out a specific, consistent approach to identifying, recording, flagging, sharing and meeting the information and communication support needs of patients, service users, carers and parents with a disability, impairment or sensory loss. Healthwatch Sandwell have explored with people with disabilities, sensory loss, or impairments
whether health and social care services are meeting their information and communication needs as required under the Accessible Information Standard 2016.

Healthwatch Sandwell have a legal power (Health and Social Care Act 2012) for Authorised Representatives to visit health and social care services and see them in action. This power to Enter and View services offers a way for Healthwatch to meet some of their statutory functions and allows them to identify what is working well with services and where they could be improved.