22 Suffolk and North East Essex ICS | ‘Our Journey Together’ 3.5 We heard the voices of everyone in the system Voices of people and communities The Suffolk and North East Essex ICS aimed to involve people’s lived experience in shaping the system as a truly transformative force in decision-making. Local people and communities can help shape better solutions that genuinely meet their needs because they are experts in their own experience, and can bring new ideas, solutions and context to a programme or service, but historically, many felt their involvement was only superficial. The ICS has worked to develop system leaders who truly wanted to understand “what it feels like on the ground”, a cultural shift from token gestures to genuine listening. Enabling people to have a voice has meant building long-lasting relationships and sharing power and influence between people, communities and health and care professionals. The ICS has worked to integrate lived experience meaningfully into service design across whole pathways, moving from “tick-box” engagement to shared decision-making. Co-production has involved people who use health and care services, carers and communities as equal partners, engaging them at the earliest stages of service design, development and evaluation. The Suffolk and North East Essex Women’s Health Insight and Oversight (I&O) Group, co-chaired by the Integrated Care Board and Healthwatch Suffolk, utilised a ‘45-degree approach’xxx to co-production where members could fully shape the programme whilst gaining insights from their communities, creating support for women that is more holistically meeting their needs. Voices of those experiencing inequality and injustice Health inequalities are systematic, unfair, and avoidable differences in health outcomes between groups and communities. Suffolk and North East Essex has diverse populations living with deprivation, discrimination, and disadvantage, who are more likely to be underserved by health and care services and more likely to experience poorer health outcomes as a consequence. Evidence shows that the wider socio-economic determinants of health have the most significant impact on health outcomes, and there is a strong and persistent link between social inequalities and disparities in health outcomes. Many in the health and care workforce also experience longstanding and persistent inequalities and injustice. Tackling inequity and injustice means taking personal and professional responsibility, ensuring that we really listen to people’s lived experience, act on their feedback, think about each individual’s needs and circumstances, and take notice and action when we identify discrimination or bias. Working together to create a fairer and more just society, with fewer inequalities is a legal, moral, ethical and professional duty for everyone in health and care, and so early on the ICS set out a collective ambition to tackle health inequalities, and this has remained a priority over the last decade. This work involves recognising the importance of preventing ill health at the earliest stage, and helping people to secure the physical, social and personal resources to meet their needs, and the agency to address their circumstances. In Picture – sharp increase in the rate of vaccine uptake by Bangladeshi community in North East Essex, February 2021 Picture – COVID-19 vaccinations co-delivered with the local Chinese community in North East Essex, 2021
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