Health Services: Disability

Since 2016, all National Health Service organisations and publicly funded social care providers are expected to meet the Accessible Information Standard (AIS), which details the recommended approach to supporting the information and communication support needs of patients and carers with a disability, impairment, or sensory loss, including deaf people.

NHS England has been undertaking a review of the AIS to help ensure that the communication needs of people with a disability, impairment, or sensory loss are met in health and care provision. A self-assessment framework has been developed to support providers of NHS and social care services to measure their performance against the AIS, and to develop improvement action plans to address gaps in implementation.

A revised AIS will be published in due course. In the meantime, the current AIS remains in force, and therefore there should be no gap in provision for people using services. NHS England is working to support implementation of the AIS with awareness raising, communication, and engagement, and with a review of the current e-learning modules on the AIS. The intention is to ensure that staff and organisations in the NHS are aware of the AIS and the importance of meeting the information and communication needs of disabled people using services.