Local Healthwatch Impact 2025-26 is based on a review of all 153 local Healthwatch annual reports and identifies three key themes which emerged from the analysis:
- Local Healthwatch provides an important source of community intelligence and early warning
- Local Healthwatch continues to play a vital role in reaching people whose voices might otherwise go unheard
- Healthwatch is helping services work better.
It singles out three areas of impact by Healthwatch South Tyneside last year – identification of alcohol misuse, specialist care homes and discharge from hospital to home.
Professor David Croisdale-Appleby OBE, Chair of Healthwatch England, said: “This year’s reports highlight the hugely significant contribution local Healthwatch continue to make in identifying and reducing health inequalities, in helping people access care, in supporting service improvement and in ensuring that people’s experiences inform decision making.”
In a letter to partner organisations and local service commissioners, Heathwatch South Tyneside Chair John Lowther, pictured, shared the new report as well as the following outcomes details in our local annual report published in June:
- 1,425 people shared their experiences of health and social care services with us
- 151 people came to us for advice and information via email, telephone and face-to-face
- We reached 19,515 Facebook accounts
- 13,931 people visited our website
- We published 14 reports about the improvements people would like to see
- More than 50 young people completed our survey on mental health
- We visited eight specialist care homes to find out what residents and their relatives thought about their care
John added: “But we couldn’t have done any of this without you. We’d like to thank everyone who has supported our work, including patients, relatives, staff and service commissioners.”
Download the Healthwatch England report here.
