News and reports

It’s Volunteers' Week, and we’ve been speaking to our volunteers about their work with local Healthwatch and with the public, and about what inspired them to support our cause.

Take a read through our new publication ‘Making your voices count’ to see this year’s winners from the Healthwatch Network Awards and also those who were highly commended for each award.

In some instances, people with learning disabilities cannot access the support they need to live independently. We look at how one local Healthwatch has been working to challenge unequal access to services for people in their area.

The shortlist has been unveiled for the 2016 Healthwatch Network Awards. The annual awards celebrate the difference local Healthwatch across the country have made to health and social care at a local and national level.

A report from the National Audit Office published today has found that the way older patients are discharged from hospital does not represent value for money. Read our response.

Find out what happened at our public Committee Meeting.

People’s patient records have a vital role to play in informing medical research and changes to health and social care services. Together with YouGov, we polled 2,044 people earlier this year, to find out more about their views on sharing their data.

Almost two thirds (64%) of people in Britain say they are happy for their personal health data to be used to support research as long as it is anonymised, bu less than 1 in 5 say they feel properly informed about current data sharing plans.

With a diverse population, it is important that local health and care services understand the needs of every section of their community. Read one example of how local Healthwatch is helping this to happen.

Find out what we plan to do over the next year.

Published today, the Care Quality Commission’s five year strategy, includes a greater focus on using the voices of patients, service users and their families, along with other information, to target inspections.

Have you had to make a complaint? Take our poll to see how your experience measured up against other people's.