Wandsworth Care Alliance

Use Your Voice to Better Your Care – Healthwatch Assembly November 2025 Recap

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We assembled with Wandsworth residents and our community partners to discuss our main focus, amplifying the patient voice. Read on for a recap of our latest Healthwatch Wandsworth Assembly.

Our Partners:

This assembly, we spoke about our main focus, the patient voice and shared some of our upcoming and ongoing work within the community. We also heard from our voluntary and community sector colleagues at Ruils, Rethink, and the Wandsworth Primary Care Patient Participation Forum who told us the ways in which they are working to make the patient voice heard. See below for more info:

Howden Insurance Brokers – Tooting 

We were graciously hosted by our neighbours at Howden Insurance Brokers – Tooting, who provided a wonderful space, welcomed us with a glass of bubbly (or soft drink!) and provided delicious food from Taabir Asian Cuisine. Howden Insurance regularly supports local community organisations and shares our mission of championing local voices and experiences to improve health and social care.

Contact:

Tel: 0208 037 9720 

Web: https://howdeninsurance/

Ruils – Independent Living:

Ruils is a user-led charity supporting Disabled children and adults and people with long term health & mental health conditions to live independently, be part of their community and to live life to the full. 

We heard about their newly launched disabled people’s forum to support people to take control of their own care.

You can sign up here for more info and to join the forum.

Contact:

Tel: 020 8831 6083

Email: info@ruils.co.uk

Web: https://ruils.co.uk/

https://youtu.be/GGbCAKre9qA

Rethink Advocacy:

Wandsworth and Richmond advocacy service providing comprehensive advocacy support to people facing challenges, discrimination, or complex decisions about the care they receive. Our advocates support people so they have a say in important and often difficult decisions about their treatment and care. This includes support with arrangements that could impact on their independence and quality of life.

Contact:

Telephone: 0300 7900 559

Email: advocacyreferralhub@rethink.org

Web: https://www.rethinkadvocacy.org.uk/

Wandsworth Primary Care Patient Participation Forum:

Primary care patient group that seeks to empower patient groups to collaborate with key players in primary care. They meet every two months and are looking for representatives from each Patient Participation Group (PPG) to tell them what they’re doing and what is happening in their practice.

Contact:

Email: info@wandsworthpatientforum.org.uk

Music by Assorted Beat:

Assorted Beat is a collective of musicians who have been playing together in various ways for 10+ years. The name ‘Assorted Beat’ pays homage to our heritage and love for a variety of styles and flavours of music. We love to vibe together, let our creatives juice flow and most of all have fun with our music.

Instagram: assorted_beat_music

Facebook: Assorted Beat Music

Updates from us:

Patient and Advice Liaison Service Survey:

We are interested in understanding what Wandsworth residents know about the NHS’ Patient and Advice Liaison Service (PALS). 

We have heard so far that people have had issues accessing PALS. So, we launched a project to gather patient experiences with the aim of feeding this back to the NHS to build understanding of what patients don’t know about the service and how we can boost confidence in PALS.

Take our survey and let us know your thoughts on PALS

Refugee and Asylum-Seeker Women’s Health Project 

Refugee and asylum-seeking women experience worse health outcomes. This is due to many factors, however we understand that when patients speak limited to no English this can impact their ability to access women’s health care service and receive appropriate treatment. 

We are working with Happy Homes Community to speak to Urdu-speaking women to find out how language has impacted their ability to access women’s health services. We will be facilitating a workshop on Thursday, 29th January 2026 at 11am to 1:30pm. If you or someone you know would like to share their experience and learn more about how they can use their voice to improve services for women, please contact:

Email: rhiann@wandcareall.org.uk

Tel: 07396820233

Or for Urdu 

Email: foziabajwah@yahoo.co.uk

Co-Production Charter:

The Wandsworth Borough Council have asked us to support the regeneration of a co-production group that lost momentum during the pandemic. 

We have produced a draft charter, which people can still comment on and influence.

Give feedback on our Draft Co-Production Charter | Healthwatch Wandsworth

We also heard from you:

We asked attendees to share how much they knew about the organisations in attendance and we heard that, although most people had somewhat heard of them, they still came away from the assembly with more knowledge of the health and social care advocacy work happening in our borough to platform residents. 

We are also delighted to hear generally positive feedback with most people saying the assembly gave them an opportunity to share their experience and ask questions. The food, drink and music were also well received. 

Learning is also important, and we heard that some attendees would have liked to hear a bit more about our future actions and strategies. We will take this on board and use this as an opportunity to make our next assembly even better. 

Look out for more information on our first assembly of 2026!

Take our Immunosuppressed survey and share your thoughts!

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We’re working on a project that is investigating thoughts and feelings around vaccinations within immunosuppressed cohorts.

If you are immunosuppressed, we want to hear from you! Help us by completing our quick 2-minute survey to share your thoughts and feelings on vaccinations. We want you to be as honest as possible, no matter how good or bad you feel about vaccinations.

Take the survey here.

The survey is anonymous and will help us in feeding back recommendations to the NHS to improve their vaccine service, from information, to booking systems, to getting vaccinated. 

If you’d like to do this over the phone, or have any questions, please contact jessica@wandcareall.org.uk

Healthwatch Wandsworth Assembly – Use Your Voice to Better Your Care

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There are proposals to change how people can raise concerns, including changes to Healthwatch. We think it’s important to talk about the different ways people can be heard when they have concerns, and we want to hear from you about what is important to make sure you know how to raise concerns and that everyone’s voice is heard.

Hear about our work on the subject and also other organisations that help local people champion their voice, including:

Nibbles and Drinks provided

For people living and/or working in Wandsworth.

Any access or dietary requirements please email us at information@healthwatchwandsworth.co.uk

Please note we will be taking photographs at the event to use in our communications, if you do not wish to be photographed let us know at the event, thank you.

Sorry if you can’t make it this time, but sign up to be a member to hear about what happened at the event and to hear about the next one.

Full address for the venue:
Howden Insurance, 149-155 Mitcham Rd, SW17 9PG, London.

About Howden Insurance:

“Howden Tooting is proud to support the local community through ongoing charitable initiatives and promotional opportunities. As part of this, Howden is delighted to support the Healthwatch Wandsworth Assembly, an important platform for amplifying local voices and improving health and care services across the borough. Supporting and celebrating community impact is at the heart of everything we do.”

Contact details

Any access or dietary requirements please email us at information@healthwatchwandsworth.co.uk

Give feedback on our Draft Co-Production Charter

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Provide feedback about our Wandsworth Council Adult Social Care Co-Production Charter.

We are working with Wandsworth Council to improve the way in which residents’ voices are heard in the design, delivery and deployment of adult social services. 

As part of this process we have been tasked with designing a charter which Wandsworth Council will adhere to as part of their Adult Social Care Co-Production work.

We have worked with residents and organisations to create a Draft Charter and now we need to hear your feedback.

https://www.healthwatchwandsworth.co.uk/sites/healthwatchwandsworth.co.uk/files/Draft%20Charter%20for%20Adult%20Social%20Care.pdf

Funding available for Women’s Health activities

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Wandsworth Care Alliance is distributing, on behalf of South West London (SWL) NHS, small grants of up to £2k for projects to improve awareness, education and self-management of women’s health (particularly in areas such as menopause, urogynaecology, and menstrual health) amongst women and young girls who struggle to access traditionally delivered NHS services. You can apply to deliver at least one of the following:

  1. Targeted and culturally specific workshops/activities – This can include a number of community-based gatherings, workshops or other initiatives providing women with a safe and familiar space to discuss menopause, urogynaecology, and menstrual health and provide access to preventative care.  As part of the grant, VCSE organisations will be expected to nurture and empower up to 3 local advocates/champions from their own communities who can support the organisation in running the activities and continue to engage women around their health after the project has ended. 
  1. One large-scale, expert-led online or in person learning event per borough attended by up to 250-300 people or/and a series of learning events that reach 250-300 people in total (e.g. webinars, Q&As, workshops) addressing menopause, urogynaecology, and menstrual health, designed to be accessible, culturally appropriate, and scalable across local populations. Please note we will only provide one grant per borough for this.
  1. School-based menstrual health education programmes to improve understanding among young girls, reduce stigma, and promote long-term well-being and/or – VCSE groups applying for this type of project will need to prove they are already working in schools.

The funding programme will be targeting women who struggle to access traditionally delivered NHS services in the following areas:

  • Addington (Croydon) 
  • Belmont (Cheam & South Sutton) 
  • Benhill (Central Sutton) 
  • Berrylands (Kingston) 
  • Beverley (Kingston) 
  • Cricket Green (Merton) 
  • Croydon North (Croydon) 
  • East Merton (Merton) 
  • Fairfield (Croydon) 
  • Falconbrook (Wandsworth) 
  • Figges Marsh (Merton) 
  • Furzedown (Wandsworth) 
  • Ham (Richmond) 
  • Hampton North (Richmond)
  • Heathfield (Richmond)
  • Latchmere (Wandsworth) 
  • Lavender Fields (Merton) 
  • Norbiton (Kingston) 
  • Petersham (Richmond) 
  • Pollards Hill (Merton) 
  • Queenstown and Battersea (Wandsworth) 
  • Ravensbury (Merton) 
  • Richmond Riverside (Richmond) 
  • Roehampton (Wandsworth) 
  • Roundshaw (Beddington, Sutton) 
  • Shaftesbury (Wandsworth) 
  • St Helier (Sutton) 
  • Sutton central (Sutton) 
  • Wandle Valley (Sutton) 
  • Whitton (Richmond)

The SWL Gynaecology Clinical Network can provide materials such as patient information leaflets, links to reputable resources and power point presentations to support these activities. The team can provide you with a list of local NHS clinicians you can invite to attend your session. You are welcome to use your own clinicians, as long as the clinical information provided during the sessions is in line with NHS guidance. Please note that requests for a NHS clinician with dates and venue should be sent at least 5 weeks in advance. We have very few clinicians available and their attendance is not guaranteed even if requested on time. Please include in your budget £100 to contribute to clinicians’ expenses, as this might be needed.

Download and read the full details and guidance of this funding below.

SWL – Womens health grants fundDownload

There is going to be an online information session for organisations interested in applying to this funding opportunity on 8th October 2025 at 10 am. Book your space by emailing Jessica@wandcareall.org.uk

There will be a training session that all successful organisations and their women health champions will need to attend, run by the SWL ICB, on the 20th November 2025.

Deadline for applications is 20th October 2025 at 5 pm. Decisions on applications will be shared by the 10th November 2025. Apply here.

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