| October 2023 | Welcome to the third edition of the West Yorkshire Voice newsletter.
You may have noticed that we have changed some of our branding, we hope it helps to show people what we do: listen to the voices of the people from all the areas and communities of West Yorkshire. | |  | | West Yorkshire Board Meetings and Engagement Session (September) | In September the Annual General Meeting (AGM) and Board Meeting took place, you can watch the meeting and read the papers on the website.
The theme of the meeting was mental health and West Yorkshire Healthwatch provided an insight report bringing together the things people have told us from across West Yorkshire along with the results of our recent survey.
Lack of support for people who are in crisis, person-centred care, communication and information, health inequalities, access, care coordination, kindness and compassion were all issues that are important to people.
After our call-out in the last newsletter WYV members and people from community organisations came forward to help us deliver the engagement session before the meeting.
There are so many concerns about mental health to talk about, but as we had an hour, we covered issues for children and young people, problems with communication and lack of options for support generally and particularly when in crisis.
The people from the community who took part did an excellent job, they spoke with honesty and described the problems, the impacts on them and the changes they want to happen.
Cathy Elliott (Chair of NHS West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board and Deputy Chair of the Integrated Care Partnership - West Yorkshire Health and Care) described how important this feedback is, she said:
‘The engagement session in the morning was extremely helpful, especially as it was ahead of the focused Board discussion in the afternoon on improving local services.’
The engagement session provided an opportunity for Board members to hear about people’s experiences of care and services, and to consider whether we are commissioning services which meets people needs. This enabled an open discussion from Board members in our formal meeting after our session about the importance of caring for people in their communities, including help for people with autism when accessing health services and the work of transforming services for the better.
It was inspiring to hear people openly share their views with humility and integrity. I am grateful for their honesty.
We heard at the session that people are tired of being asked about their experiences of mental health support and not seeing real change; they want services to be better connected across the NHS; and they want to see outcomes based on the experiences and stories they have already shared.’
Big thanks to everyone who came to the engagement session, supported people to participate, as well as everyone who gave their time to fill in the survey.
The next board meeting and engagement session will be on Nov 21st and the theme is Primary Care, this includes doctors (GP), community pharmacy, dental and eye health services.
The engagement session will explore positive examples of good practice and successful changes and services. This could be when good access is provided, when it’s easy to communicate and get an appointment, when staff go the extra mile to help and include people with sensitivity and respect.
We hope that the engagement session will shine a light on solutions so that good practice can be shared and spread across West Yorkshire.
Let us know if you have any good examples we can take to the session in November.
Get in touch with Jude at West Yorkshire Voice:
info@westyorkshirehealthwatch.co.uk | | |
 | | Access to Dentists - Update | Since the Integrated Care Board meeting which discussed Access to Dentists last May, the report and video presented at the meeting highlight people’s experience of accessing dental support in West Yorkshire.
The first meeting of the Dental Involvement Group met on Tuesday 3rd October, and was attended by people with lived experience including those with mental health needs, voluntary organisations, and dental practices. During the session participants had an update on the programme so far; and a lively discussion about experiences, frustrations and possible solutions.
To support flexible commissioning, the ICB will be trialling a Citizen Jury model of co-production; to look at the difficult problem of oral health and dental services in new ways creating new ideas and different ways to overcome barriers to better oral health.
Get in touch with Kirklees Healthwatch if you want to get involved in the Reference Group. | | |
 | | Health Information – Testers Needed! | |  | West Yorkshire Health and Care Partnership often share information about health and healthcare services with the public. It is important that everyone can understand this information so we want to ask West Yorkshire Voice members if they can help - could you be an online communications tester?
Becoming a tester involves joining the Communications Feedback Group and working with Christine Hughes, one of the Partnership’s communications managers.
What would I have to do?
Receive information in an email, read it and send Christine your feedback.
Go to some online meetings to look at information and give your feedback.
How much time will be needed?
You can get involved as much as you want to. We understand that sometimes you might be busy and may not be able to respond to an email or attend a meeting.
We estimate members of the group will receive around six emails every month, and the online meetings will be every two months.
If you are interested or want to find out more contact Christine. | | | | Can you help? | Do you take medications like Canagliflozin, Dapagliflozin or Empagliflozin to manage your health condition?
The staff who support people with long-term conditions want to involve people who have lived experience of diabetes, heart failure and/or chronic kidney disease and are taking these medications in a new project. It will help GP practices to better connect with patients who could benefit from this medication. People with real life experience can contribute their views and ideas to help make things better for others.
If you would like to know more or get involved contact Laura Williams laura.williams114@nhs.net by the 31st of October 2023. | |  | | Stroke patient and carer representative group | Are you a stroke survivor or a carer for someone who has had a stroke?
Join our patient and carer group and share your views to influence how we deliver stroke services in your area.
- Help to inform decisions and give your views on our plans
- Meet others from across West Yorkshire and Harrogate with experience of stroke
- Improve the experience of stroke survivors and their families
- Share your story
- Opportunity to volunteer to represent stroke community
- Online meetings every 2months
- Support and guidance to carry out your role
If you are interested in joining this group, please email:
katie.johnson@nhs.net
hannah.harris21@nhs.net
You can also give tell us about your experience and views of treatment after a stroke, and support for their carers, to give their feedback using an anonymous online survey.
The survey is open until 3rd November and you can link to it here. | | |
| New Mental Health Community Panel | |  | A chance to make a difference
We want volunteers to be part of a new community panel that will have their say on mental health services in Wakefield district.
If you have experience of local mental health services please get in touch.
Contact Michelle on 01924 787379 or email michelle.poucher@helathwatchwakefield.co.uk
| | | | Mental Health Crisis and the 111 service | The NHS has an aim, that by April 2024 if you are experiencing something that makes you feel unsafe, distressed, or worried about your mental health, you will be able to contact your local crisis service by calling 111 and selecting the mental health option for urgent support.
In West Yorkshire we have been working on how we achieve this. We plan to connect our existing crisis services and helplines so that when people do not know who to contact, they can call 111 and be connected to their local mental health helpline without having to speak to a 111 call advisor.
Depending on the time of day and where you are calling from the telephone system will determine which of our existing mental health crisis services you will be connected to, this could be the West Yorkshire Helpline, Bradford’s First Response Service, NightOWLS or one of our 5 CAMHS crisis services. There will be a number of options to select to make sure you are connected to the right helpline.
You will still be able to continue to contact services in the same ways as you do now, this is just an extra way of making sure that people who call 111 for mental health support are connected to the right service in good time and without having to repeat lots of information.
We want to understand whether and how this change may affect your experience of accessing mental health support in a crisis. We would also like to hear about how you would prefer to contact mental health services in a crisis so that we can ensure any communications we develop are clear as to how to get urgent mental health support.
If you would like to get in touch we welcome your thoughts and comments; please email tamsyn.hughes@nhs.net | |  |
| Can you represent a voluntary organisation on a new neurodiversity working group? | The West Yorkshire Health and Care Partnership’s Harnessing the Power of Communities Programme (HPoC) works to strengthen partnership working between the voluntary, community and social enterprise sector (VCSE) and partners working in health and care. In this way, we aim to have a positive impact on the health and wellbeing of the population in West Yorkshire (WY) and reducing health inequalities.
As part of this work, the Mental Health, Learning Disability and Autism Programme (MHLDA) Neurodiversity Workstream is seeking ten VCSE representatives to be members of its newly formed West Yorkshire VCSE Neurodiversity Working Group. If you would like to join the group email wyicb-wak.hpoc.program@nhs.net | | | Do you want to be a ‘Community Voice’ in Kirklees? | The Community Voices programme is delivered by Voluntary & Community (VAC) on behalf of West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board – Kirklees. It is a free online training course, for staff or volunteers who work for community organisations in Kirklees, to become an accredited ‘Community Voice’.
Once the person has completed the course, they seek the views of the organisation’s members using focus groups and surveys. This can also earn income for their organisation.
Find out more here and email engagement@cvac.org.uk if you want to get involved. | |
|
