Working with Local People

We believe that involving people in their health and services is essential.

By giving people information, by involving them as partners in looking after themselves and by enabling local people to talk about what matters to them, we want to improve health and services in Southwark.  Evidence shows that care is more effective if people play an active part in making decisions and services are designed with local people to meet local needs.

The Patient Advice and Liaison Service (PALS) and Public Involvement Team have been working with local people to achieve the following outcomes and actions.

Patient Advice and Liaison Service (PALS)

Over the past year our Patient Advice and Liaison Service has been working with colleagues within the PCT and local health economy to promote the services provided and to look at new ways of working.

PALS aim is to use patients’ comments to improve services, provide accurate information about local health services and help people to sort out issues that are of concern to local people. Nicola Lucas, Patient Advice & Liaison Service Manager at the PCT, said: “We pride ourselves on our accessibility and our ability to resolve concerns quickly and with respect and sensitivity.  “This year we have developed an exciting piece of work with the voluntary sector to build PALS champions within our community.”

Outcomes

The year has been a good one for the PALS:

• the service was recognised nationally for its work within King’s College Hospital Accident & Emergency in the 2005 National Health & Social Care Awards.  PALS within A&E educated over 1,500 patients about the use of A&E and primary care, with more than 600 patients helped to access primary care 
• through the PALS helpline and the casework team over 5,200 patients have been helped in accessing health services.  Concerns that required local negotiation have led to significant pieces of work around GP registration, primary care for Care Home residents and improvements in the PCT’s direct managed services.

 
Patient and public involvement in Southwark
The Public Involvement Team continues to ensure that procedures are in place to hear and listen to the voices of local people in Southwark. We have continued to involve and consult, engage, and feed back via our various public involvement measures.  We are pleased to report that more people have become involved and their voice has had greater impact across the borough and within the PCT throughout 2005/06.

Outcomes

• this year the Public Involvement Team ensured patient and public involvement is embedded within the development of Practice Based Commissioning
• continued to develop the structures and support provided to PCT and practice staff to help them with involving patients and the public, such as through training, the Public Involvement Toolkit, PPI leads meetings and one-to-one advice
• worked with the Southwark Overview and Scrutiny Committee and the Patient and Public Involvement Forum to further develop relationships to ensure involvement develops in line with the recently published fundamental review of Patient and Public Involvement, particularly in relation to involvement in commissioning
• given ongoing support to the North and South Southwark Diabetes Patient Participation Groups and further developed of dialogue between participants and the Lambeth and Southwark Diabetes Network in order to ensure views are influencing service development.

Actions

Over the past year through work with local people, actions to improve local services have included:

• expanding the Expert Patient Programme (EPP) to include pilots for Bengali EPP and Supporting Parents EPP courses for Southwark residents
• setting up the new Service User Committee which will ensure that improvement of user experience is a priority across all parts of the PCT
• continuing to provide and develop the PALS service both within the PCT and King’s A&E
• ensuring that PALS is open and accessible to all, PALS has produced information on the service in Braille, CD and audio format (it is also available to download in seven other languages through www.southwarkpct.nhs.uk/patientadvice).

To find out more about PALS
please contact a team member on 0800 58 77 170 or email pals@southwarkpct.nhs.uk

The Public Involvement Team
They can be contacted on 020 7346 6444 or email
perpetua.egan@southwarkpct.nhs.uk for enquires on GP Involvement and the Expert Patient Programme, or nicky.saynor@southwarkpct.nhs.uk for information concerning Public Involvement Toolkit, Training and Update or Practice Based Commissioning.