Diabetes care and support

Report - 30 October 2023

A report into people’s experiences of diabetes care and support in Shropshire

There are currently 30,000 people living with diabetes in Shropshire, Telford and Wrekin (STW) and the proportion of adults living with the condition is the 16th highest out of 42 areas in England. Furthermore, the rate of people receiving the ‘National Institute for Health and Care Excellence’ (NICE) recommended care processes is the lowest in the country.

The local NHS is therefore looking at ways that care and support for those with diabetes or at risk of developing diabetes can be improved. To assist this, we worked with organisations to gather patient feedback about their current care and improvements they think could be made.

We developed a survey with NHS STW and the Shropshire Public Health team to look at people’s experiences of diabetic care and promoted this widely through our media channels and community contacts. We contacted all the GP practices in Shropshire and had support from two Shrewsbury practices which sent a link to our survey to their diabetic patients. We had 211 complete responses.

Recommendations

  • Provide a range of approaches to education, both face to face and online to meet the varying needs of the patients. Consider how the X-PERT course or similar could be built into the offer to all patients with a diagnosis of pre-diabetes or type 2 diabetes.
  • Use the patient suggestions put forward in this report to help inform the current service development.
  • Consider how patient groups can be established and supported to enable patients to have ongoing peer support to help manage their condition and help inform further service developments.
  • Work with professionals and patients to increase the use of written care plans to ensure that patients are valued as active participants and experts in the planning and management of their own health and well-being.
  • Consider how psychological support can be offered as an option to all patients.
  • Review how lifestyle support is provided, especially to those with a pre-diabetes diagnosis, to ensure the request for more information and support around healthier weight, dietary advice and physical activity is met.

Downloads

Full report
Download (PDF 492 KB)
Appendix A - Demographic Information
Download (PDF 264 KB)
Appendix B - Survey questions and responses
Download (PDF 591 KB)

If you need this report in a different format please contact us:

enquiries@healthwatchshropshire.co.uk

01743 237884

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