SIR – I attended an event last week to listen to the concerns of Bradford district residents with sensory impairments (most of whom were totally deaf or blind) regarding their experiences of health and social care.

They had some real horror stories to share about their difficulties in dealing with GP practices and hospitals in the district. I felt many of the issues would be fairly easy to address if all GPs and hospital departments were open to providing fully-accessible services and if each NHS body was implementing the Equalities Act.

People’s notes – electronic or paper – did not appear to have any readily-identifiable label or marking that indicated someone was blind/deaf or sensory-impaired, nor were notices put over beds when people were in-patients.

Some departments will ring blind people with appointments or send in large print to sight-impaired people, others will not.

Blind/sight-impaired people said they relied on family or friends to read letters and leaflets so have no privacy. I promised I would follow up by a) writing to the local NHS equalities officers group, b) flagging this up as an issue for health scrutiny and, c) writing to the T&A.

I hope that minimally we can get some consistency in how different GPs and hospital departments take care of access and support needs of sensory-impaired patients.

Councillor Jan Smithies, Keighley West Ward, Braithwaite Village, Keighley