Doctors of the World is a leading charitable organisation which aims to break down barriers to healthcare and prevent social injustice for millions, both globally and within the UK. Currently based in London, Doctors of the World provide medical care, information, and practical resources for minority groups who continue to struggle with access to basic healthcare. In this month’s episode of the Practice Manager podcast, Nicola, Robyn and Ben are joined by Dr Yusuf Ciftci, Policy and Advocacy Manager, and Janet Alfred, National Health Advisor, from Doctors of the World to discuss the issues of access in-depth. From the thorny issues of current bureaucracy, prejudice and misunderstanding to re-education and improvements via the medium of programmes such as the Surgeries Initiative, and a powerful personal account of Janet’s own experiences, today’s podcast is a must-listen for general practice in raising awareness of the importance of inclusion – and improving health outcomes for all.

 

 

Introduction (9 secs)

 

Doctors of the World; the charity, and its aims (25 secs)

 

All about Yusuf (1 min 47 secs)

Janet’s background and her role as a National Health Advisor (2 mins 40 secs)

Janet details her own experiences, including the disparities between England and Scotland in accessing healthcare (3 mins 32 secs)

Why registering with a GP surgery is not necessarily straightforward (4 mins 17 secs)

Prevalence of the registration and access issue (5 mins 21 secs)

Nicola’s view (6 mins 20 secs)

Robyn’s perspective and feedback from the IGPM (8 mins 10 secs)

Re-educating practice staff (9 mins 20 secs)

Improving access and support (10 mins 6 secs)

What changes can be made right now? (12 mins 11 secs)

Doctors of the World’s Safe Surgeries Initiative (13 mins 4 secs)

Signing up for Safe Surgeries (14 mins 24 secs)

Clarification on the resources available (15 mins 5 secs)

Addressing health inequalities as a practice and as a network (15 mins 46 secs)

Robyn’s thoughts about escalation of poor health outcomes and prevention of these locally (17 mins 13 secs)

Janet’s thoughts about how to positively effect change (17 mins 49 secs)

Finding out more (19 mins 26 secs)

 

The Doctors of the World webpage, which contains all of the resources discussed in this episode, including The Safe Surgeries toolkit, can be found here. You can sign up for the initiative here

The Practice Index website is here

For all enquiries about the Practice Index / Ockham podcast, please contact James Dillon here or Ben Gowland here