Health, Care & Wellbeing Experiences in Richmond During Coronavirus
We collected 376 experiences from people between 12/03/20 and 09/07/20 relating to care and wellbeing during the coronavirus pandemic.
These experiences covered a wide range of NHS, social care and community support.
The analysis of these experiences intends to inform the recovery of services from the peak of coronavirus cases and the associated social distancing.
Service is always excellent, but visiting the surgery when frightened, I was impressed with the efficiency/kindness of nurse and doctor in full PPE clothes. It gave me such confidence that I had come to the right place to be treated
Key headlines
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Overall, most people were able to get the care that they needed.
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People will be receptive to accessing care via phone and video call where it is easy to access and meets their needs in a timely manner. But where people need procedures or need to build rapport, face to face care is still needed.
- The same is true for asking people to call their GP, NHS 111 or 999 before they go to A&E or urgent care.
- People are anxious about the risks of exposure to coronavirus. Explaining the levels of coronavirus in the community and the measures being taken by providers to keep people safe will help to address this, enable people to be more independent and encourage people to seek treatment when they need it.
- Sharing plans for changes to care and the NHS with people will enable them to identify and unexpected or unintended consequences so that they can be avoided.
- There are some suggestions that community mental health services have not been meeting people’s needs effectively and that the issues that we've previously identified have not been resolved.
- People without the technology and skills to access support online are disadvantaged. “Bridging the digital divide” requires supporting people to gain both the technology and the skills to access support online or providing support and information through traditional methods.
- Carers were disproportionately impacted by the crisis. The closure of face to face support left them to fill the gap for the person they care for, without the respite that came from their cared for person being away from the home and at a time when they have less face to face and social support themselves.
While many may see the light at the end of the tunnel, we can’t.
Other people will be able to move on, whilst us, the more vulnerable are going to fall back.
I would only feel confident if there were no deaths in hospital and the R rate was near 0. Ultimately a vaccine is the only thing that will make me feel safe.
