Healthwatch South Tees Community Champions

What is a Community Champion? 

Healthwatch relies on local people sharing information with us.

As an independent champion for people who use health and social care, we’re here to make sure those running services, put the voice of the person at the centre of care. This ensures services continue to develop to reflect the changing needs of the people.

We want to understand the needs, experiences, and concerns of people who use health and social care services – especially those who are vulnerable, and whose voices are not always heard, and to speak out on their behalf.

Community Champions are our vital link to these communities, they understand the needs of the people they support and by sharing anonymised experiences relating to health and social care, identify gaps in service, or highlight factors contributing to poor health and we share this information with the relevant services.

YouTube video: How Community Champions influence our work! 

What do we do with the information you share with us?

• We share this information with the relevant services, our contacts and any forums we are involved in, e.g. the South Tees Live Well Health and Wellbeing Board and the Patient Experience Steering Group at JCUH. This will allow for strategic decisions to be influenced by local people.
• Any patterns and trends that we identify from the intelligence will steer our workplan priorities, decisions and Enter and View activities (a formal activity where we attend a service to get feedback from patients/public and staff to see how well it is working).
• Share specific intelligence with decision makers to improve services or influence future commissioning priorities.