Patient Experience and Engagement

The Patient Experience Team offer a free and confidential service for patients. Through our Patient Advice and Liaison service (PALS), we can help answer any questions about your experience with the hospital, listen to your suggestions, queries and concerns and can offer advice and support for you, your relatives, carers and friends. We can offer ‘on the spot’ advice if you have queries or difficulties about health services, provide information about hospital services and help you find other organisations or groups that may be helpful to your situation.

We also welcome positive feedback and messages of thanks from patients and relatives about your experiences.

Our opening hours are 9am to 4pm, Monday to Friday. We are situated in the North Wing Level 1 near main reception.

You can contact us by calling 0800 7838058 or emailing patientexperience@dchft.nhs.uk

Complaints

If you or your family are unhappy with any aspect of your care please talk to the person in charge of the ward, clinic or department as soon as possible. Very often problems can be sorted out straight away. If you feel they are unable to help you and you need information, advice or support in resolving a problem, or you would like to make a complaint, please contact the Patient Experience Team. Your complaint will be treated in confidence. It will not be filed on your health records or affect your treatment. You will not be discriminated against.

Making a complaint
To allow us to assist with your complaint as quickly as possible it would be helpful if you could provide the following information when raising your complaint:

Patient details (name, address, date of birth, telephone number and hospital number if known)
If you are raising a complaint on behalf of a patient – then your name and contact details and your relationship to the patient
A clear description of your complaint. If you are raising more than one complaint, it helps to number each point. This helps us to make sure we answer all of your concerns
The ward/department to which the complaint relates or the name of the member of staff involved
Copies of any relevant documents to assist with the investigation.

If you need help in making your complaint or information about the complaint process, you may wish to contact, The Advocacy People. They provide support which is independent of the NHS and free of charge:

The Advocacy People
Advocacy Support
PO Box 375
Hastings
East Sussex
TN34 9HU
Tel: 0330 440 9000

Email: info@theadvocacypeople.org.uk

Website: theadvocacypeople.org.uk

Consent
If you are making a complaint on behalf of a patient, we will ask for the patients written consent. If they are unable to do so, we will ask for consent from their next of kin. This is to confirm they have given you permission for our Patient Experience Team to provide you with specific details about their treatment and/or care.If your complaint involves another Trust or agency, we will need to have your consent (or thatof the patient) to contact them and obtain information for a joint Trust / agency response.

Timescales for making a complaint
A complaint should be made within 12 months of the incident occurring or within 12 months of discovering you have cause to complain. Complaints received outside of these timescales may still be considered if is clear there are good reasons for complaining and it is still possible to investigate what happened.

The Patient Experience Team will acknowledge receipt of your complaint by telephone or email within three working days of it being received. We will invite you to discuss the way in which you would like the complaint to be investigated and fed back you and discuss the length of time we expect the investigation to take. If the timeframe will be longer than initially anticipated, you will be provided with an update.

Please be aware that staff in involved in the investigation of some complaints may need access to the health records of the patient concerned and, in such cases, patient confidentiality will be respected at all times.

Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman
If you feel that your complaint has still not been resolved, you can write to the Parliamentary and Health Services Ombudsman. This is a free service. The Ombudsman, who is appointed by Parliament and is completely independent of the NHS, will decide whether or not to investigate the complaint. The Ombudsman will not usually take on a case that has not been through the NHS complaints process.

Feedback – tell us about your experience

There are a variety of ways you can leave your feedback with us, whether that be positive or negative:

Friends and Family Test
The NHS Friends and Family Test (FFT) is an important opportunity for you to provide feedback on the services that provide your care and treatment. Your feedback will help NHS England to improve services for everyone.

It was introduced in 2013 and asks patients whether they would recommend hospital wards, Emergency Departments and maternity services to their friends and family if they needed similar care or treatment. This means every patient in these wards and departments is able to give quick feedback on the quality of the care they receive, giving hospitals a better understanding of the needs of their patients and enabling improvements.

For more information about the programme visit the NHS England website.

How does it work?
When you are discharged from a service, you will be you will be asked:

“Overall, how was your experience of our service?”

You can rank your answer from “very good” to “very poor”. You will have the opportunity to explain your score by adding comments, and you may also be asked some follow-up questions. This is important because service providers can only make changes if they know exactly what is or is not working.

You may be asked to answer the question before going home, or you may be invited to do so by returning the FFT form or by using a QR code link which will allow you to complete the FFT online.

Women will be asked the question at four points during their maternity care:

Antenatal care – to be surveyed at the 36 week antenatal appointment
Birth
Care on the postnatal ward – to be surveyed at discharge from the ward/birth unit/following a home birth
Postnatal community care – to be surveyed at discharge from the care of the community midwifery team to the care of the health visitor/GP (usually at 10 days postnatal).

Do you have to respond to the question?
Your answer is voluntary. But if you do answer, your feedback will provide valuable information for your hospital to celebrate good practice and identify opportunities to make improvements.

Your answer will not be traced back to you, and your details will not be passed on to anyone. A member of your family or a friend is welcome to answer the question if you are unable to.

If you feel that you should have been given the opportunity to respond but did not receive the question, please contact the Patient Experience Team.

Please also contact our Patient Experience Team if you would like more information on how the test will be carried out in our hospital.

Tell us about your experience leaflets
These leaflets can be found around the hospital and have a section within them to leave written feedback. They can be left in one of the hospital feedback boxes located on patient experience boards around the hospital or you can post them back to the Patient Experience Team:

Patient Experience Team
Dorset County Hospital
Williams Avenue
Dorchester
Dorset DT1 2JY

Care Opinion
You can share your feedback with us via the Care Opinion website.

Join our Your Voice – Patient Voice group
Your Voice is our Patient Voice group and meet regularly to provide feedback on patient experience and to give feedback to hospital staff on hospital developments. Through Your Voice there are also opportunities to get involved in engagement/involvement events and support specific departments and projects as a patient representative. To find out more and express an interest in joining Your Voice, please email yourvoice@dchft.nhs.uk

Useful contacts

Patient Experience Team
Dorset County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
Williams Avenue
Dorchester
Dorset DT1 2JY

Tel: 0800 7838058
Email: patientexperience@dchft.nhs.uk

Chief Executive
Dorset County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
Williams Avenue
Dorchester
Dorset DT1 2JY

Tel: 01305 251150
Email: headquarters@dchft.nhs.uk

The Advocacy People
Advocacy Support
PO Box 375
Hastings
East Sussex
TN34 9HU

Tel: 0330 440 9000
Email: info@theadvocacypeople.org.uk
Website: theadvocacypeople.org.uk

Healthwatch Dorset
Freepost BH1902
896 Christchurch Road
Bournemouth BH7 6BR

Tel: 0300 111 0102
Email: enquiries@healthwatchdorset.co.uk
Website: www.healthwatchdorset.co.uk

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman
Millbank Tower
Millbank
London SW1P 4QP

Helpline tel: 0345 015 4033
Fax: 0300 061 4000

Email: OHSC.Enquiries@ombudsman.gsi.gov.uk
Website: www.ombudsman.org.uk

Care Quality Commission (CQC)
Finsbury Tower
103-105 Bunhill Row
London
EC1Y 8TG

Tel: 03000 616161
Email: enquiries@cqc.org.uk