Online feedback touches so many people

What has my experience of being involved in Care Opinion been over the last couple of years? Most certainly, more than I expected.

A couple of years ago I happily took on an opportunity to help relaunch Care Opinion into the Children’s Unit with Dr Gita Modgil. It has been a great project to be involved in and I discovered quite quickly that Care Opinion is more than just a means to collect patient feedback: it creates all kinds of impacts far beyond what I expected at the start. For example, before my involvement during the pandemic, Care Opinion was such a useful way to encourage parents to attend hospital if they were worried about their children, helping to prevent delayed presentations.

The majority of Care Opinion posts are extremely positive about our service, and can be very specific, naming individual staff members. It’s such a lovely way to boost staff morale. Patient feedback is very much valued in our department and everyone is very appreciative of the feedback especially with everyone working so hard during these busy times. It includes all staff members of all bands and grades of training, from the most junior to the most senior. It’s inclusive to everyone in the team.

It’s such a lovely way to boost staff morale

I share all our feedback in a timely way with all staff members, usually within 24 hours. I also share posts in our paediatric improvement group to highlight our achievements and where we can improve our care. We are very open and transparent to all the comments made, helping us to improve our patient care as a team.

More recently Gita and I have given staff certificates when they are named in posts, including the specific feedback about them. Nurses really value this as it is responsive feedback and they include it in their appraisals.

When I started I thought Care Opinion stories would only focus upon the paediatric department. Actually, when parents post feedback they include their child’s whole journey, mentioning other specialities and departments who looked after their child. They may talk about their A&E experience, because very often a child will be assessed first in the emergency department and then referred to paediatrics. We may also need to refer other specialties, including ENT or surgery, and parents will include these teams within their story. I share the story with those teams too. I feel this helps establish better working relationships with other specialities as cross-specialty feedback highlights how we all work as one big team when caring for patients and their families.

On one occasion we had to call in security staff to an incident on the children’s unit, and we had a post on Care Opinion from another family who witnessed this, and posted about how well the security team supported the staff on the ward. We also have positive comments about our cleaning staff. It is lovely to share these responses with them, as it acknowledges how their hard work is very much valued and appreciated. So it’s not just about clinical staff.

People can see we are listening and want to make things better

Sometimes the feedback we receive show we need to improve particular areas of our care. Care Opinion has allowed us to provide real-time and meaningful responses to be given directly to parents. I think this can help rebuild and restore trust which may have been lost during a difficult time the patient and family may have experienced during their stay with us. I also feel Care Opinion has been a hugely useful platform in giving us the opportunity to able to response again to the family, updating them about any changes we have made at a later date. People can see we are listening, and we want to do something about the issue, and make things better for other families. I’ve had a parent respond back and say: “well it wasn’t a good experience, but I can see you are listening, and that means something”. I think that can be healing.

Within the hospital, paediatrics can be a little separated from the main trust. We are geographically separate and we don’t interact very often with other departments within adult medicine. The feedback through Care Opinion helps raise our profile within the hospital and has given us a chance to say “this is what we are doing, and this is what we need to support further change”. We are also very keen to share our learning from Care Opinion patient feedback with our hospital colleagues.

What started as a creative mission has become far more than just that

Our directorate managers have really embraced this now, and it’s a regular part of our governance. In the coming year we’ll be taking Care Opinion feedback into directorate meetings and we hope more adult specialties will take it on. We have had a lot of interest from some very passionate nursing colleagues in paediatric outpatients who want Care Opinion there. I hope it will grow further in 2023.

So, reflecting on my experience of Care Opinion, what started as a creative mission to improve feedback opportunities for patients and families has become far more than just that. One patient story, be it sharing a kind word or encouraging a change for better care, creates a wonderful ripple effect. The positivity it creates grows and expands, touching an individual member of staff, the paediatric department, cross-speciality departments and colleagues and most importantly the patients and families we care for.