Best care for our mothers and fathers
01 November 2013 Case study
Topics and programmes
Prior to working with the Point of Care team at the King’s Fund, the Royal Gwent Hospital had established a multidisciplinary group with the aim of improving the quality of care for elderly patients admitted with a broken hip. Despite improvements, they felt that they had not fully addressed the experience from the patient’s perspective.
Joining the PFCC programme, the team shadowed patients and conducted in-depth interviews with patients. From this they mapped the key domains which patients found most important. These domains were: pain, communication, hygiene/dignity, food and staff behaviour. These were integrated into their existing driver diagram and the stories were shared amongst the staff.
Once they stopped defaulting to clinical processes of improving care and began to view care through the eyes of patients and families, they incorporated these changes:
- Paramedics now inform patients of what will happen in hospital to alleviate fear
- Patients are now given a private area to use the commode/bed pan
- Patient kitchen and day area being developed to provide food/drink when they need it.
What the team learned about patient experience:
- There was a strong tendency for us to default to clinical processes of care because it was easier to understand, measure and to implement changes
- Small changes from a single patient experience can result in big differences in care
- The motivation and plan for change did not originate from data but individual patient stories
- Sharing patient feedback was a positive motivator for staff and may improve sustainability.