Some thoughts about the importance of good quality patient information

I was talking to someone this week about their experiences as a physio patient at their local NHS hospital and then subsequently at a private clinic.

The big thing they wanted to tell me was about the difference in the standard of the information sheets they were given, and how this affected their confidence in the service they were receiving. The NHS sheets were photocopies of photocopies, barely readable, misaligned so that some of the line endings were missing. The private clinic had printed out clear, colourful sheets specially, and offered to email the PDF.

Let's assume that everything else was equal between these two clinics - the clinical standard of the treatment and the written content of the information sheets - the poorly presented information had still left this patient with a bad impression of the service they received from the NHS - that their clinical care might have been second rate and that their individual needs had not been valued.

So why was this particular clinic giving out such poorly produced information? It wasn't that they couldn't do better - they had access to an in-house designer. It wasn't about money - they had access to a print-on-demand service that cost no more than photocopying (and emailing out a PDF costs nothing). What this came down to was front line staff not appreciating the importance of high quality information and how it affects the whole patient experience.

Branding is still often seen as a dirty word by many in the NHS, but this is what it's all about - making sure that the NHS values - above all professionalism - are reflected in everything it does. Hospitals can offer the highest quality clinical care, but unless patients feel that their individual needs are being acknowledged they are increasingly at liberty to go elsewhere.

It's sometimes seen as crass to think of patients as customers, but I think that this is exactly the right thing to do, putting their needs first - and that includes making sure that the standard of information provided is of the highest quality.

Posted by Brian 21.8.11 [ page link ]

Testing the QRD Template for patient information leaflets

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Posted by Anna 6.5.11 [ page link ]