Accessible Information Standards (AIS)

AIS applies to people who use a service and have information or communication needs because of a:

·         Disability

·         Impairment

·         Sensory Loss

It covers the needs of people who are deaf/Deaf, blind, or deafblind, or who have a learning disability. This includes interpretation or translation for people whose first language is British Sign Language.

It does not cover these needs for other languages.

It can also be used to support people who have aphasia, autism or a mental health condition which affects their ability to communicate.

It is important to the practice that we meet the individual needs of our patients and establish if information from us needs to be delivered in a different way.

We may know that a patient is deaf, but what we don’t know is how this patient communicates; do they use British Sign Language (BSL); do they need an interpreter present; do they prefer to lip read; do they use a notebook?  We cannot make assumptions about the needs of our patients.

We ask all of our new patients to inform us of any communication needs when they register with us, but our existing patients also need to be aware of this information.  Therefore, we ask our existing patients to let us know if there is any particular information about your communication needs you think we should be aware of.

If you, or someone you know who is a patient, feels there is a need we need to know about, please complete an Accessible Information Standards patient form by clicking here and either bring it in to the surgery.