Over the last 12 months we have been supporting The Health Equality Partnership gathering insights and data through a health research and engagement program.

It was an exciting 6 month project which started in June 2021 and was commissioned by Public Health Dorset and NHS Dorset Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG), and enabled us to gather community insights and identify any areas of hidden inequality that people from diverse communities, with enduring mental ill health or learning disabilities face across Dorset.

We worked in partnership with Dorset Community Action and Dorset Race Equality Council on this initiative to understand more fully the views of those with enduring mental ill health, learning disabilities and individuals from diverse communities using health services, the challenges they face, and their overall experiences. These individuals often fare poorly in terms of general health and life expectancy when compared to the rest of the population.

Our research sought to increase understanding of local health inequalities and public awareness of health inequality, to empower vulnerable people to shape and improve the health system, to clarify the link between social determinants and uptake of preventative health measures, to generate reliable, valid and objective data to support future research and assess progress with reducing the healthy life expectancy gap for mental health, learning disabilities and ethnic minorities in Dorset.

We are now able to share the report and its recommendations and would like to thank all those who took the time to be involved.

Health Inequalities Project Report Easy read health inequalities report

We are now working with the Health Inequalities Group, Dorset CCG and Public Health Dorset to explore how we can address some of the recommendations highlighted in the report moving forward and look forward to working with you to continue to support our communities to address health inequalities. 

If you have any further questions or comments please email Andy Robertson, Project Officer on [email protected]