Social Audit... Research Findings - Local Services - Health and Well Being

back to research findings

2.6.2    Health and wellbeing  

As can be seen in table 10, results from the 2001 census demonstrate that by any measure  the health of the population in Treorchy fares considerably worse than England or Wales as a whole. For example, the proportion of the population who are permanently sick and the proportion of the population who claimed to have had poor health during the last 12 months was approximately double the figure for England and Wales.  

Table 10: Key Health Statistics From the 2001 Census.

These findings are not new as the South Wales Valleys have historically suffered from high levels of poor health largely as a result of the accidents and diseases associated with the mining industry. Conventionally smoking and alcohol consumption and poor diet have ensured high rates of heart and respiratory diseases. The Census data underscores a need for high quality health services in the area which is arguably greater than that in other areas. In so far as the quality of local health services can be measured by residents reported satisfaction levels the survey results show that this need has largely been met. As can be seen from Table 11, for each of the five categories of health care and support services that respondents were asked to rate between 74% and 90% of respondents gave ratings as excellent, good or acceptable.  

Table 11: Respondents describing health and support services as either excellent, good or acceptable.  

However, other aspects of the research findings indicate a number of problems and gaps in provision. For example, a number of individuals in Cwmparc clearly lacked faith in the quality of the services provided by the local GP’s surgery. These views appear to be largely based on communication difficulties with Asian doctors in the local practise, but the way in which they are articulated also points to a certain level of underlying racism in the community:  

“the doctors are crap. My doctor is in Treorchy and they are brilliant. My friend has to drive me though”

“I use this doctor but am not fussy on him”

“It would be nice to see a white doctor, this one is crap, some people have actually died when he has just sent them home”    

In other focus groups some participants, although praising the actual quality of medical care commented on the difficulties of actually accessing this care as a result of travel difficulties. One individual commented on this at length:     

“we have to travel if we need to go to the hospital. There is no help with the travel. If you are an out patient then you have to book an ambulance. I needed to go to hospital and was told to phone the surgery. I ended up waiting for six hours after leaving messages that there was a hospital bed waiting for me that I couldn’t get to. Sometimes you can’t get an ambulance when there is an emergency.”    

Finally, the research uncovered a clear demand for support, rehabilitation and preventative services for drug and alcohol misusers. In the section of the survey which asked respondents about health or support services they would like to see developed  44% (the largest single category) identified drug and alcohol services.    

Conclusion 10:

In common with other Valleys areas residents of Cwmparc, Treorchy and Ynyswen clearly suffer disproportionately from poor health. Although there are high levels of reported satisfaction with health and support services, there are also reported instances of communication difficulties with local GPs and transport difficulties when accessing hospital treatment. There appears to be a particular gap in provision of health services in relation to drug and alcohol services. 

Recommendation 8:

That the group seeks to develop active partnership arrangements with local drug agencies in order to develop a pro-active system of support alcohol and drug misusers together with a programme of education aimed at the general population. This is a Valleys wide problem and it may well be desirable to develop links with other areas experiencing similar difficulties.

return to top of page

* * * * *

please send your news items to - news@Treorchy.net

Treorchy.net aims to provide you with an accurate news section - if you find a factual error, please let us know!