Q&A session highlights from our AGM
The Board of Trustees and I would like to extend our thanks to all members who attended our Annual General Meeting on Zoon on 21st July 2021. We know that Zoom isn’t perhaps the most enjoyable way to listen to the showcase and achievements of Healthwatch Milton Keynes and we do hope to return to holding our larger event, in person, when it is appropriate to do so.
We thank you, our members, for continuing to support Healthwatch Milton Keynes with undertaking those matters in relation to governance under our constitution at our AGM this year.
At the end of the AGM, we opened up the meeting to members to ask questions on our activities and thoughts about all things in relation to the health and social care landscape in Milton Keynes. We publish the questions and answer session, so you can see what some of your fellow members are interested in addressing with us.
Question 1
Member: I would be interested to know how you see the Mental Health Partnership Boards and Community Actions Mental Health Alliance collaborating together.
We said: The Mental Health Alliance is the bringing together of various community and third sector groups to ensure that they’re aware of developments in the offer of mental health services in Milton Keynes, where they, as organisations, can place themselves within the mental health landscape and ultimately be better equipped to bid collaboratively for funding where appropriate and available now, and in the future. The mental Health Partnership Board is about professionals that pay for and provide mental health services meeting with members of the community experiencing mental ill health to listen to their experiences, ensure services meet their needs and involve them in the design of any changes. The Mental Health Partnership Board will continue to be a conduit for the voice of this community to Commissioners, service provider and the Mental Health Alliance. HWMK’s vision is that the people experiencing mental ill health will be able to tell the Mental Health Alliance what they need from a voluntary sector offer, as they do already to providers of core community services such as CNWL.
The Alliance is in its early development and Healthwatch Milton Keynes is very much a part of that Alliance and we look forward to working with the Alliance moving forward.
Question 2
Member: My question is around access to GPs and digitally excluded patients. HWMK engagement work has outlined a focus in that area. It is a significant risk in that we’re moving to a stage where GPs aren’t physically seeing their patients and perhaps not intending to return to the situation as it was before the pandemic. What can we do, what are Healthwatch Milton Keynes’s specific plans about taking this forward locally and what impact we can have?
We said: We have Milton Keynes based issues around GP access. Prior to the Covid pandemic there was a health system project around increasing access to digital appointments and telephone consultations in Primary Care. The pandemic really forced digital and telephone consultation to be embedded into practice and now GPs are being asked to return to face-to-face appointments. Primary Care practices face a massive backlog in patient care and different practices are taking different approaches in how much they open up to face-to-face appointments and the continued delivery of digital and telephone access.
One of our top questions from the public is currently “How do I get to see my GP?” Healthwatch Milton Keynes has been working on a Bedfordshire, Luton and Milton Keynes wide Group with local Healthwatch on GP Access taskforce which is looking at specific issues in GP access. The digital access does work for some people, and it is about finding that balance.
Healthwatch Milton Keynes is currently arranging an event in collaboration with Milton Keynes GP Federation, aimed to be a listening space between local GPs and patients and developing solutions together on that balance between face-to-face and digital access.
It is a shame in many ways that GPs have invested so much energy in such a short amount of time to get up to speed and have a digital offer and in many ways that can be a really good tool for some patients and a big barrier for other patients and there is a grey cloud over the digital offer.
Healthwatch Milton Keynes want work with patients and practices to ensure there is an offer tailored specifically to the groups that benefit from digital access and face-to-face access for those that need it. There is a journey around the backlogs and an inconsistency in approach in practices. Healthwatch Milton Keynes met with the Clinical Directors of the Primary Care Networks last week to discuss how we move forward around those areas of inconsistency. HWMK has good relationships with Primary Care Networks (PCNs), sit on the PCN Alliance group and we’re confident there is scope for collaboration to address patient access issues.
Question 3
Member: Healthwatch Milton Keynes has previously discussed engagement with people about access to dental services and I highlight that it is something Healthwatch Milton Keynes should focus on in conjunction with GP Access. Covid restrictions have highlighted the weakness in dental provision.
We said: Healthwatch Milton Keynes, even prior to Covid heavily focused on access to Dentistry. We had undertaken a project looking at the provision of NHS Dentistry in Milton Keynes and found it woeful and we met at the time with the regional commissioner. As part of that work, we were involved in the specification for the design of the new 8-8 Dental service which has now opened.
We have since had a change of commissioner and we have been meeting with those commissioners throughout the pandemic to address the issues people have been having in accessing emergency dental care. The poor access to dentistry hasn’t gone away. The new service may have helped ease pressures a little but demand still outstrips supply. Our understanding is that the move toward more regional commissioning through the Integrated Care System will bring dental services closer relationship to local commissioning.
Healthwatch Milton Keynes have been instrumental in building relationships between the regional NHS dental commissioners and the Integrated Care System. Because dental services are not commissioned by the local clinical commissioning group, but dental services are classed as Primary Care, they are not always adequately included in local treatment pathways. The ISC and NHS Dental commissioners are now working together to integrated dental care into local treatment pathways for diabetes and cancer, as examples.
Access to general dentistry continues to be a challenge at the moment and related to Covid. The 8-8 service opened as the pandemic took off. They may have been able to support general demand more but due to the Covid to ongoing treatment restrictions and previous closures, they’ve only been able to see a third of their patients. There is pressure to see private patients which provide a greater level of income than NHS contracts. There are some urgent dental treatments centres across Bedfordshire, Luton and Milton Keynes. Whilst Dental services continue to meet infection control guidelines that require greater spacing of patient appointments, access will continue to be a challenge. Healthwatch Milton Keynes will continue to focus on listening to people’s experiences and feeding these into the ICS and Dental Commissioners to ensure issues are addressed.
