Updated Accessible Information Standard is out
On 30 June, NHS England published an updated version of the AIS, which was established in 2016 to ensure people with a disability, impairment or sensory loss could receive healthcare in an accessible format and have access to communication support, such as British Sign Language (BSL) interpreters.
Read about your rights to accessible healthcare.
What has changed?
Changes to the standard include:
- A new and sixth, “review” stage requiring NHS and publicly funded adult social care services to proactively check that patients’ and service users’ needs are up to date in their records and that are being met. This is in addition to the five stages asking services to identify, record, flag, share, and meet people’s communication needs.
- All health and social care organisations should appoint a senior named role responsible for overseeing the standard being put into practice.
- Clarifying the role of commissioners, such as Integrated Care Boards (ICBs) and councils, who should ensure that providers in their area follow the standard.
- An expectation on all providers and commissioners to identify an AIS lead responsible for ensuring the standard is met as well as an executive-level role holder with responsibility for the standard in their remit.
- An expectation that all NHS and social care organisations assess how well they are meeting the Standard. This can be done through a new NHS provider self-assessment tool and the first assessments should be completed by March 2027.
What do we think?
Louise Ansari, our chief executive has responded to the news:
“We have been advocating for a stronger AIS, working with national charities since 2022. Our evidence, which led to a review of the AIS, highlighted that the NHS fails to provide healthcare in accessible formats, blocking patients from care and affecting their ability to make informed decisions.
“The revised AIS clarifies that providers and commissioners must have 'due regard' to the standard when providing services but don't have to fully meet it until further legal regulations eventually come into force.
“We are therefore disappointed that full mandating of the standard is still potentially years off, particularly when it is meant to improve access to healthcare for disabled people and those who have sensory impairments.
“The revised version does contain some positive changes, such as introducing an expectation on NHS and adult social care providers to annually self-assess how well they currently meet the AIS and what action they need to take to fully comply with it. However, the first assessments are not due until March 2027. This slow pace of improvements will mean that many disabled people and those with sensory impairments will continue facing challenges to accessing care, often putting their health and wellbeing at risk.
“We acknowledge that services and Integrated Care Boards are grappling with many pressures, including increased patient demand for care and reorganisation, but we urge them to prioritise compliance with AIS as a vital step towards tackling inequalities in access to care.”
About our campaign
In 2022, we launched the Your Care, Your Way campaign to highlight the urgent need to strengthen the AIS and raise awareness of its shortcomings.
Our research followed feedback from over 6,000 people who have sensory impairments, disabled people, and their careers.
Our Freedom of Information request to NHS trusts uncovered that out of 139 who responded, only a third (35%) told us they are fully compliant with the AIS.
We subsequently sat on an NHS England stakeholder advisory, alongside national charities such as RNID and RNIB, to make the case for a stronger AIS. We also wrote to the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care to call for a fully mandatory standard.
What are the next steps?
We will work with NHSE as it prepares a case for the Department of Health and Social Care on making the standard mandatory.
We will also promote people’s rights under the Equality Act 2010 to reasonable adjustments from services to meet their needs and we will urge providers to begin self-assessments as soon as possible.
We will remind the public of their right to use the NHS complaints process to get services to respond to any concerns that their communication and disability needs are not being met.
