Support our campaign: Your care your way
About the campaign
Campaign background
Clear, understandable information is important to help you make decisions about your health and care and get the most out of services.
Since 2016, the Accessible Information Standard has given disabled people and people with a sensory loss the legal right to get health and social care information they can understand and communications support if they need it. But, is the standard being delivered by services and does it go far enough?
We want to help NHS and social care services understand the answer and make sure health information is clear for everyone, no matter what their needs.
Our campaign ‘Your Care, Your Way’ aims to:
- Find out how well health and care services are delivering the Accessible Information Standard.
- Make sure that, if the standard covers you, you know your rights.
- Find out who else has problems understanding information about their healthcare and needs to be covered by the standard.
- Make sure more health and care services support people to get healthcare information in the way they need it.
Key audiences
Public audiences
Our two key public audiences for the campaign are:
- Those covered by the existing Accessible Information Standard (people with hearing-loss, sight-loss, vision impairment, learning difficulties and carers).
- Those not covered by the existing Accessible Information Standard (e.g. people with dyslexia or who speak English as a second language).
Health and care decision makers
Our two key professional audiences for the campaign are:
- Health and care commissioners and managers who are responsible for implementing the existing Accessible Information Standard.
- Health and care leaders who are responsible for making and implementing changes to the Accessible Information Standard and holding services to account.
Campaign timeline
The campaign will launch on 23 February 2022
Phase one - raising awareness of existing issues and people's rights
Phase one will run for the first month, from launch until 20 March 2022.
This phase is aimed at raising awareness of:
- The launch of our campaign and how people can get involved.
- The issues we have already found with public feedback and our recommendations to improve the ability of services to support accessible health and care information.
- The rights that those covered by standard have.
- Asking people already covered by the Accessible Information Standard about their experiences.
Phase two - calling for action
Phase two will run from 21 March 2022 until the beginning of May.
This phase will focus on collecting feedback from people not currently covered by the Accessible Information Standard about their experience of being able to get clear, understandable information.
Key messages
Public audiences
Our key messages are broken down for the two specific audiences.
Audiences covered by the Accessible Information Standard:
- You should be given healthcare information in the way you need it.
- You have the right to be told about your healthcare in a way you understand.
Audiences not covered by the Accessible Information Standard:
- Everyone should be given healthcare information in the way they need it.
- Health information should be clear for everyone, no matter their needs.
- You should be told about your healthcare your way.
Health and care decision makers
Health and care commissioners and managers
- People who are blind, deaf or have a learning disability have the right to be given health information in a way they can understand.
- Many people have told us that they are not getting the support they need to access care and make decisions about their health.
- Make sure you are meeting the Accessible Information Standard so more people are given healthcare information in the way they need it.
National health and care policy makers
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Research shows that only a third of NHS trusts are fully complying with the legally-binding Accessible Information Standard.
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NHS England and the Care Quality Commission need to hold health and care services to account in the implementation of the Accessible Information Standard to protect people's rights.
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Health and social care leaders, especially within Integrated Care Systems, must act to ensure people are given healthcare information in the way they need it.
Calls to action
You can use these key call to actions during the campaign
- Find out about the campaign
- Find out more about your rights to accessible information
- Share your experiences with us
- Five steps to help services meet the Accessible Information Standard
Campaign assets
Design
Colours
If you want to create your own resources or graphics for the campaign, the colours are taken from our updated colour palette.
- Pink - HTML E73E97
- Green - HTML 84BA00
- Light blue - HTML 7fcbeb
For more information on how to use our new visual brand, check out our visual guidelines.
Download from Communications Centre
Photography
You can download photos to use in your assets from our Flickr library for free. This includes our recently added album of photos taken at the climbing centre with our main case study for the campaign.
Social media
Social media
Use our #YourCareYourWay social media messages to support the campaign and to encourage feedback. The messages below for each channel are broken down for the awareness phase and the call to action phase.
You can download the assets to use with your social media posts from The Communications Centre. In addition to this we have also produced editable templates for the campaign that you can put your own logo and messages onto.
Each local Healthwatch has one log in to access these resources, if you need help accessing The Communications Centre please email hub@healthwatch.co.uk
PR resources
Press release
We have issued a draft press notice that you can use on Workplace. Please note that the information in this is under embargo until launch.
Website story
We have produced a news story you can publish on your website on the launch day to help raise awareness of the campaign. Please note this must not be published on your website before the campaign launches.
Email resources
Email headers
To help you design your email communications you can download our branded header from The Communications Centre
Template emails
- Support our campaign email template for MPs and charity partners.
- Make your service more accessible email template for professionals
Survey resources
We have produced our online survey for the public to complete in several different formats.
Paper version of survey
Advice resource
We have produced an advice and information article around what people can expect from the standard, that you can use to put on your own site.
Other promotional materials
We have produced a range of other promotional materials you can use to support the campaign. These include:
- PowerPoint template
- Posters
You can download these from The Communications Centre to adapt to your own Healthwatch.
Video
We have also produced a video of our case study, Connor. You can use this video for your own communications too.