The document discusses several barriers to accessing health and social care services: inadequate resources due to lack of funding, staff, and equipment can lead to delays in treatment; physical difficulties in traveling to services; issues with communication for those who do not speak the local language, are deaf/blind, or illiterate; and ignorance about available services. It provides examples of each barrier and proposes ways to overcome them, such as increasing funding, extended service hours, improved transportation options, multi-lingual materials, sign language interpretation, and community outreach/advertising.

1. Barriers to services

2. Inadequate resources
 Lack of:
 Funding
 Staff
 Equipment
 Lack of the above can lead to delays in
receiving treatment

3.  Examples of inadequate resources
causing delays:
 Not enough care home places so elderly
people have to wait
 Hospital doesn’t have a scanner so
patients have to travel
 Wards closed due to lack of staff so waiting
lists longer

4.  Overcome barrier of inadequate
resources by increasing funding, e.g.
 Increase local taxes
 Social services budgets
 NHS funding
 Increase national taxation – alcohol,
cigarettes, petrol etc.

5.  Funding not always the answer:
 May not be enough suitably trained staff to employ
even if the funding to do so is available, e.g. no
consultants or specialist nurse practitioners
around to employ then remains an inadequate
resource!
 Overcome this by:
 providing more training places at universities
 Improving working conditions, e.g. pay
 Encouraging people to enter health and care professions

6. Physical difficulties
 People may find it difficult to get to services:
 May work away from home
 Opening times may not fit in with working hours
 Live in rural areas – no car, can’t drive, no public
transport
 Elderly and/or disabled may find travelling difficult
due to transport not being adapted to their needs.

7.  Overcome physical barriers by:
 Having NHS walk-in health centres where
appointments are not necessary
 Extended opening hours
 Community transport to hospital, GP
appointments, day centres and so on
 Provide home visits for some clients, e.g.
community nurses

8. Communication
 Speak different language
 Deafness
 Blindness
 Illiteracy
 Overcome barriers by
 Multi language leaflets and information sheets
 Hearing loops
 Braille
 Signers
 Advocates

9. Ignorance
 This means lack of knowledge about the
service. May be:
 Don’t know the service exists
 Don’t know how to access the service
 Don’t know that they have the right to the service
 Overcome this barrier by providing
information:
 Advertising in newspapers or on TV
 Leaflet distribution to houses or in health centres