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Independent Website Goes Nationwide For Patients To Drive NHS Change

“Patients throughout England are playing an active role in driving change in the NHS” said Dr Paul Hodgkin, Sheffield GP and Chief Executive of Patient Opinion, the independent, not-for-profit organisation, as www.patientopinion.org.uk goes nationwide this week. 

www.patientopinion.org.uk is an independent platform for patients to share their experiences and make informed choices about their healthcare, and to facilitate change within the NHS. 

Since the introduction of patient hospital choice in England in 2006, people needing non-emergency surgery have been able to select from a list of hospitals for their treatment.  www.patientopinion.org.uk is enabling patients to see what other patients have said, when deciding which would be most suitable for their treatment.

Dr Hodgkin said: “We want patients to log on to www.patientopinion.org.uk and feedback their positive and negative experiences of hospital care in England.  Patient Opinion directs patient feedback straight to the hospital managers who need to see it, for subscribing hospitals. This independent feedback to the NHS motivates staff by providing the recognition they deserve and also helps clinicians and managers to improve services.”

The site also enables subscribing hospitals to respond to feedback online.

“We want to help patients make informed choices about their healthcare” Dr Hodgkin continued: “www.patientopinion.org.uk was set up to enable patients to share their experiences of healthcare and by doing so help other patients.  The opinion of patients is key to the success of the NHS – to ensure that hospitals are made accountable for the level of service they offer.  We want all opinions – good and bad – so that we can acknowledge good care and at the same time encourage hospitals and trusts to acknowledge issues and work to rectify them.”

Omnibus research carried out by ICM* between 30th May and 3rd June 2007 found that 91% of adults in the UK feel that the NHS should be learning directly from patients personal experiences in hospitals. 

74% also stated that they would find it useful to have access to a website which provided reviews and comments that other patients had made about the hospital’s service if they were going into hospital.

www.patientopinion.org.uk has been piloted for the last 20 months in England.  Currently over 4,000 ratings or comments about hospital service have been posted on the site and in March this year approximately 350,000 pages were viewed on the website.  Over fifty organisations now contribute or subscribe to Patient Opinion including Trusts, PCTs, Strategic Health Authorities, patient groups, and GPs.

ENDS

Notes to editor
To view some interesting postings and responses click on any of the links below:

Title	Town	Why Interesting	Tiny URL
4 month wait for brain scan	Preston	Treatment deviates from best practice	http://tinyurl.com/29txqw
I'd love to put my arms around all the staff	Rotherham	Nice thank You	http://tinyurl.com/2j35gf
Northampton –worries about cleanliness	Northampton	Emotional story, good response from Trust	http://tinyurl.com/2uftmx
The Registrar was an Officer and a Gentleman	Rotherham	Great thank you	http://tinyurl.com/2govfa
A few simple changes could make ward a lot better	Sheffield	Good suggestions +two comments	http://tinyurl.com/22jpss

* ICM Research interviewed a random sample of 2026 adults aged 18+ by telephone between 30th May and 3rd June 2007.  Interviews were conducted across the country and the results have been weighted to the profile of all adults.  ICM is a member of the British Polling Council and abides by its rules.  Further information at www.icmresearch.co.uk

BACKGROUND INFORMATION
Patients want to know what other people think about their local services.  This is even more true now that patients in England can choose where they receive their treatment.  Since January 2006 people needing non-emergency surgery have been able to select from a list of at least four hospitals enabling them to be treated at a hospital which best suits their needs.  If they do not wish to choose, their GP will recommend the most appropriate hospital.  A choice of hospital is available for the treatment of most medical conditions.

Patient Opinion
Patient Opinion is an independent, not-for-profit organisation, founded in 2005 by Dr Paul Hodgkin, a Sheffield GP and its Chief Executive.

Patient Opinion provides, through its website, www.patientopinion.org.uk,
an independent platform for patients to share their healthcare experiences, make informed choices about their healthcare, and to facilitate change within the NHS. 

www.patientopinion.org.uk
This website has been piloted over the last 20 months mainly in selected areas and enables patients to share the story of their care and rate the quality of service that they have received.

All feedback is previewed prior to publication and where necessary, moderated to ensure legality.  Feedback includes many positive opinions as well as negative ones and over 95% of submissions are published.  Postcode analysis suggests that responses come from across society.

www.patientopinion.org.uk allows everyone to see what patients are saying about NHS and many private hospitals, and to compare how they have been rated by previous patients.

Patient Opinion enables hospitals to direct postings to just the right manager via a weekly email. The system also allows a wide range of organisations to respond on-line including: hospitals, primary care trusts and patient organisations. The on-line conversations that result are a unique way to access the insights that only patients have about how services can be improved.  Being on-line can give stories real bite and also allows hospitals to publicise the changes they sometimes make as a direct response to patient suggestions.   NHS subscribers to the site can also generate reports to benchmark their services against others, while PCTs can monitor the quality of services they are purchasing.
 
From 6th June 2007, Patient Opinion wants to encourage the nationwide usage of the website.
 
In summary www.patientopinion.org.uk generates real-time feedback that:

• Helps patients make the right choice about where they should receive hospital treatment
• Improves services across the NHS.

Funding
In order to succeed Patient Opinion must be trusted by both patients and the NHS and it has therefore been set up as a not-for-profit social enterprise. 

It is open and transparent about how it works and what it does, and it is run as a sustainable and financially independent business - any surplus is used to support patient engagement across the NHS. 

Patient Opinion is funded by subscriptions from healthcare bodies such as PCTs, Trusts, SHAs and the Healthcare Commissions who use the anonymised data to monitor and improve services.  Having contracts with many different NHS and private sector providers means that Patient Opinion can remain financially independent.

To maintain its independence the site is also free of advertising.

Technology
www.patientopinion.org.uk uses Web 2.0, the same technology that drives sites such as Amazon YouTube and My Space.