Representatives from Leicester LINk will be attending the meeting to outline the forthcoming changes in Health and Social Care and of the setting up of 158 Health Watch’s across England who will gather the experiences of local people on health and social care services, but will also have powers to scrutinise and make referrals to Health Watch England and the Care Quality Commission.
Minutes:
John Gater and Barbara Czyznikowska from Health Watch (formerly known as LINk) gave a presentation to the meeting. This presentation referred to the current changes in Health and Social Care arising from The Health and Social Care Act 2012, which was considered to be the biggest reform of the National Health Service since it began.
The meeting was informed on the principle provisions of the Act which included the change of the Local Involvement Networks (LINks) to Health Watch. Other changes included the abolishment of Primary Care Trusts, which would become Clinical Commissioning Groups and the formation of Health and Wellbeing Boards.
Members of the community were informed about the Leicester City Commissioning Group and the Health and Wellbeing Board and the liaison work with the City Mayor where social need and aims and objectives were being mapped. Community representatives and members of the public were asked to contact Health Watch with any areas where it was felt that a gap in service currently existed. Members of the community were urged to contact Health Watch with their experiences of health and social care.
At this point in the presentation a feedback questionnaire was circulated to the meeting in respect to of the ‘Health Watch Leicester – Interim Vision’. Attendees at the meeting were asked to indicate whether they agreed with the Vision Statement and the questionnaire included a section for completion where consultees were asked to comment on any suggested alternative wording. An invitation to the Shadow Board’s engagement event was also circulated. It was noted that the development of a Joint Health and Wellbeing Strategy for Leicester had begun and the importance of this consultation exercise in the process was expressed.
At the conclusion of the presentation attendees were invited to complete an evaluation sheet whereby they could indicate what they felt the principle values of Health Watch should be. As part of the evaluation attendees were also asked to complete their contact details in order that they could be invited to future public meetings.
The Chair explained that the changes were very important and for the first time the Council would have a statutory brief to scrutinise health and social care. She added that she had raised concerns with the City Mayor relating to customer care at the Glenfield Hospital. These issues included problems for visitors obtaining a cup of tea or coffee at the weekend and the change machines filling up very quickly in the car park so that it was impossible to obtain change to pay to park.
A member of the community also commented that in response to the Government’s proposal to increase consultation appointments to 15 minutes, there would be fewer appointments granted, therefore an increase in surgery times were needed to compensate. He was asked to pass his details to Barbara as this request could be recorded and submitted.
A further concern was raised from an attendee who stated that his GP had moved to Oadby from the City and he was unable to find a GP closer to his home. John responded that he and Barbara represented the Leicester City Health Watch but they had links with the County Health Watch and would raise this issue with them.
A comment was raised that Health Watch appeared to be similar to an organisation that had existed a few years ago, which at the time had significant powers. Barbara responded that the aim was that Health Watch would have even more powers that this previous organisation.
John and Barbara were thanked for their presentation and the Chair commented that it would be interesting to know how Health Watch was progressing and therefore they might be invited to provide an update at a future meeting.