Worcestershire Integrated Sexual Health Service

Together we provide friendly, non-judgemental, specialist services. Supporting you to manage your sexual health. Log-on, call-us, drop-in.  

We empower patients to improve their sexual health through education and positive lifestyle changes.

We aspire to be consistently professional in our roles and actively demonstrate this to patients and colleagues.

We feel competent and confident within our roles and supported by colleagues to achieve individual and team objectives.

We value positive praise and constructive feedback which motivates us to strive for excellence.

Our strengths enable us to do our very best. Our patients deserve the excellence we provide.

We encourage each other to raise concerns through the appropriate channels – we know they will be dealt with competently, confidentially and with sensitivity in line with Trust policy.

The education & health promotion team

The sexual health promotion team have a wealth of experience supporting staff working with young and vulnerable people.  We help plan relationship & sexual health education curriculum for schools and colleges.  We provide staff training on topics relating to relationships and sexual heath to help fellow professionals cascade key messages with confidence. 

We can negotiate educational sessions directly to some particularly vulnerable people and students on occasion; however we don’t routinely offer classroom delivery to pupils.

The C-card scheme

The C-card scheme provides an opportunity for young people to get free condoms from trained staff.  This is to help young people keep safe and reduce teenage pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections.

Young people (up to and including 19 years of age) meet with a trained worker who discusses their relationship and when appropriate gives condoms. 

All staff have experience of working with young people and are trained before giving condoms. Everything remains confidential, unless (on rare occasions) someone is at significant harm or risk, then safeguarding guidelines will be followed.  

C-Card returns monitoring form Nov 2018 [doc] 54KB

CCard Guidance Oct 2020.pdf [pdf] 1MB

 

Outreach nurse service

WiSH sexual health nurses work with young people who cannot or are unable to access main stream sexual health services. There are six outreach nurses who work across Worcestershire. The specialist sexual health nurses can see young people in schools, homes, community settings or any appropriate venue to meet the needs of a young person. Referrals are accepted from professionals (School health nurses, teachers, midwives, police, CSE team etc…). Sexual health nurses offer one to one support for young people to offer information and guidance regarding contraception, sexually transmitted infections and safer sex. 

Referral criteria:

The service aims to improve access to nurse led level 1 and 2 sexual-health care. The service will be offered to high risk and vulnerable populations as well as those that are not able to access services due to learning, mental and physical disabilities. Services should be provided where clinically appropriate, and suitable alternative provision made otherwise.

Outreach Referral form NEW April- 2019 [doc] 168KB

Worcestershire Integrated Sexual Health (WISH) is a confidential service.  This means we will not share information about you without your knowledge.  All patients have the right to expect that information about them is held in confidence. Patients will be properly informed how information about them is used.

To help give patients the best care possible, sometimes we will need to share information about you and your health. This is rare and we will always let you know before we share any information about you.

There are specific rules, which are governed by law, which we must follow.  Examples of times when information might be shared include:

• When a patient has capacity and has given valid consent to share information. 
• When it is necessary to safeguard an individual or others.
• When there is a legal duty to do so, for example a court order

We may share information with some of our partner agencies with your consent, if they share responsibility for your health care.  

We have a duty to disclose general information about our patients for statistical and public health reports.  All information that is shared for audit, research and epidemiological reasons is anonymised.  Our partners who provide IT systems and support which hold Patient identifiable information must sign up to confidentiality regulations.

How is my information shared? Sexual Health Poster for Print