Video for migrants on how to access primary health in the London borough of Newham

Accessing health is an important issue for migrants, especially those who are new to the country. Primary health care is a term used to describe GPs, Dentists and Pharmacists and in the UK it is generally the first point of contact with health services. Accessing primary health should be possible for everyone who lives in the UK. It is important to access healthcare through the National Health Service (NHS) as this can prevent serious health consequences for people. However, a number of migrants do not access primary health either because they do not know how to or they encounter barriers in doing so.

According to NHS Newham ‘the video was produced to let everyone know how Health services work in Newham. The Health Services in Britain are very different in the way they work than in other parts of the world.  The video gives an understanding of how to register with a GP.  Registering with a GP can be an issue but there are ways that this can be addressed and the DVD highlights how this can be done. The DVD can be watched in any one of 23 languages.’

‘NHS Newham trialled the DVD with a number of communities and this was uploaded onto YouTube by those Communities. The YouTube video is available in several languages including English, French, Lithuanian, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, and Somali, as they were trialed with these communities through The Roma Support Group and Aston Mansfield’s Health Communicator Project. Even though the video applies to people living in the London borough of Newham, some of the issues and procedures are the same for other boroughs. Community and voluntary groups working with clients who speak these languages should find the videos useful in their work, especially if they work with Newham residents.’

Better information and consistency within health providers is needed to ensure that migrants are not unfairly excluded from health provision. Extending access to health services amongst recent migrants is an important part of ensuring migrants’ rights and this is an area of interest in MRN’s work which we hope to develop further in the future alongside partner organisations.