Responsive
We maintain our ability to set up services quickly in response to need and we provide accessible services in a wide range of places in collaboration with other providers.
We give a voice to those who may otherwise not be heard and we reflect and learn from feedback and change what we do. Our Equity Development Managers are key to ensuring we are co-creating, which often means collaborating with, or even employing, members of the local community to better connect with their peers.
We assess how we are meeting people’s needs through our various methods of patient feedback.
Our Equity and Clinical Services group ensures that there is an ongoing review to ensure our services meet people’s needs and are accessible. This forms part of our commitment to inclusivity which is centred around our commitment to listening to the needs of different groups of people and acting on them.
We also support our PCNs in understanding the needs of their population through health inequalities projects and strategy development.
Audit of our clinical services is one of the ways we assess the impact of this and ensure that we are supporting people e.g. audit of Enhanced Access appointments ensures we are complying with the Standard Operating Procedure in supporting people when referred to other services.
The Equity and Clinical Services teams hold monthly meeting to identify where people’s needs and choices are not being met to inform how services are improved and developed through the review of public health data, patient feedback, audits and clinical and quality assurance visits.
We ensure that our services are provided across a range of locations and different access opportunities for example pop-up community clinics, @Home services and our home visiting vaccination service. We also develop relationships with other organisations and system partners that have allowed us to engage with patients in hostels and refuges for example.
The Standard Operating Procedures for our services set out the expected standards for timely access, these are monitored through monthly performance reporting. We are commissioned to provide Enhanced Access outside of core hours and 12 hour GP cover and ensure that the provision of these services match the needs of the population through data review and patient surveys. We have also established new services that improve timely access for patients including GP e-Hubs, urgent GP provision, paediatric acute respiratory clinics and a supplementary wound care service.
We aim to deliver the highest quality of care for our patients, but we know that sometimes, things go wrong. If patients feel that the treatment or service they have received fell short of their expectations or they have cause for concern they are encouraged to let us know and can access the ‘Tell us about Your Experience’ page on our website or through the service manager or by telephone. We take all concerns and complaints seriously, treat them confidentially, investigate each one individually, and respond as quickly as possible (within 21 days). We acknowledge the importance of complaints and use them as an opportunity to learn how to improve our services and all aspects of the patient experience.
Compliments and recommendations from the outcomes of complaints and concerns raised, reported through the online Ulysses Risk Management System, are discussed at the monthly Quality Improvement Meeting and are shared via the Quality Communication Channels including staff and service meetings and through the monthly Quality Update bulletin.
