Reasonable Adjustments in Healthcare

Thank you for sharing this. It's nice to know I'm not alone. I have just posted about this too (Difficulty Accessing Reasonable Adjustments at My GP). It's very distressing when an NHS GP practice does not respect the Equality Act 2010. The only thing within my power is to put in complaints.

It is really sad that you can no longer engage with the service. Have you considered therapy to help deal with the issues you've mentioned, like overwhelm and distress?

Many thanks for your response. Lucky enough I am under NHS Talking Therapies and as you kindly suggested did let my physiological therapist know my experiences and the impact. Im actually blown away by the response. 

1. Therapist reported problems to a  governing board member who said that they felt this needs to be addressed and therefore will ve bringing it up at the next meeting. 

2. Therapists wrote to my GP explaining the problem and asked if a referral could be made to community dentist service who they felt where the more appropriate service to meet my needs.

3. Has offered to attend a social services meeting so we can address this and ask for an advocate. The council have an advocacy service that can attend all appointments where an advocate is needed e.g DWP, Council, NHS etc. 

I would also like to respond to your problem regarding GP practice and reasonable adjustments as in my experience a complaint didn't address reasonable adjustments issues with my bank or council however,  I took the matter to the ombudsman service and they were outstanding. On xmas eve I received a decision of significant injustice against my complaint regarding the council and the financial ombudsman has now come back to me regarding bank and again agreed significant distress was caused. Both orginisation have now got to put in place reasonable adjustments, send ombudsmans proof this has been done and pay compensation. The outcome was solely based on an unbiased opinion based on the law and the facts of the case. I recommend this avenue if you are still struggling with the reasonable adjustments at you GP practice. 

Thank you for sharing your story. It seems that progress has been made.

I wanted to let you know that I have taken my situation to the ombudsman, and they have informed me that there is nothing more they can do. The GMC has also confirmed that the GP has taken the correct approach, noting that their role is to determine whether a doctor is fit to practice.

I am interested in learning more about the role and purpose of the governing board member you mentioned.

My experience with RA's via the NHS is mixed - one hospital has a designated autism nurse, others will cater to you once GP does a letter stating your requirements and presenting an autism passport... Overall, there's major room for improvement!

As for the Equality Act 2010, no one appears to know what it entails when quoted to them and when it comes to RA's, one has to be proactive in some cases to obtain basic human rights from the NHS, councils...

My advice to anyone experiencing an uncooperative GP is to find a better one, as you should not have to go down the complaint route for RA's in order to access healthcare.

Apologies for delayed reply. Im so sorry to hear about your experience with the ombudsman and your continued struggles regarding reasonable adjustments. I would have thought not getting reasonable adjustments in place would be a substantial disadvantage meaning the service becomes inaccessible or distressing to navigate. Thats how my ombudsman dealt with it. I was put at a distinct disadvantage and treated differently than others. 

The NHS governing body get together periodically to discuss issues within the NHS. The fact that failure to make reasonable adjustments means that autistic people are not able to engage with or assess healthcare or are so overwhelmed on the day they cannot turn up for appointment is something the governing body wants to look into as a concern. Apparently here the nhs are aware that autistic people are not engaging with healthcare but they lack the lived experience of autistic people. Ive offered to be an expert by lived experience if our hospital put together a panel to investigate this. Its a nightmare getting healthcare and extremely distressing in my experience. 

Apologies for delayed reply. Im so sorry to hear about your experience with the ombudsman and your continued struggles regarding reasonable adjustments. I would have thought not getting reasonable adjustments in place would be a substantial disadvantage meaning the service becomes inaccessible or distressing to navigate. Thats how my ombudsman dealt with it. I was put at a distinct disadvantage and treated differently than others. 

The NHS governing body get together periodically to discuss issues within the NHS. The fact that failure to make reasonable adjustments means that autistic people are not able to engage with or assess healthcare or are so overwhelmed on the day they cannot turn up for appointment is something the governing body wants to look into as a concern. Apparently here the nhs are aware that autistic people are not engaging with healthcare but they lack the lived experience of autistic people. Ive offered to be an expert by lived experience if our hospital put together a panel to investigate this. Its a nightmare getting healthcare and extremely distressing in my experience. 

My experience with RA's via the NHS is mixed - one hospital has a designated autism nurse, others will cater to you once GP does a letter stating your requirements and presenting an autism passport... Overall, there's major room for improvement!

As for the Equality Act 2010, no one appears to know what it entails when quoted to them and when it comes to RA's, one has to be proactive in some cases to obtain basic human rights from the NHS, councils...

My advice to anyone experiencing an uncooperative GP is to find a better one, as you should not have to go down the complaint route for RA's in order to access healthcare.