How good are we?!

 On 11th March 2015 staff from the Patient Experience Team attended the Patient Experience Network Awards in Birmingham after being nominated for Patient Experience Team of the Year.  The ceremony gave our staff an opportunity to meet people from all over the country who are working to improve the Patient Experience (as well as eat nice food and cake!).

Sadly the  Trust did not win though we were runners up amid stiff competition.  The day gave the whole team lots to think and talk about and we’ll be looking to integrate some of the ideas into our work in the next few months.  It’s the taking part that counts after all and a great honour to be part of the day.

While it was wonderful to be nominated and attend the ceremony (and good to have a day away from the office) it’s important not to forget why we are here and what the team is about.

  We’re here to improve the Patient Experience after all and it’s the service users and carers we support who can tell us whether we’re doing that or not.  How do we do that?  Well, our latest figures show that complaints are down and compliments are up which has got to be good news.  We also have more ways than ever for people to feedback about our service and the NHS Friends and Family Test is up and running now too.

We hope that more and more people will make use of initiatives such as Real Time Feedback and of course Patient Opinion as well as through more traditional routes but if you have any other ideas then please let us know.  It’s your experience after all; how can we make it better?