August Update 2011
The practice would like to thank those who have already signed up to join the patient group, we greatly appreciate your involvement. At present we are still building up our numbers and if you are reading this and would like to become a member please get involved by completing a registration form( Click Here).
The aim of the group will be two fold, first and foremost is to help facilitate a dialogue between the practice and patients, providing a forum not only for your feedback but also for us to react and respond. We also need the group to help us facilitate our role in a national project called the Patient Participation DES. This sets out a national strategy for improving the interaction between practices and their patients. The aim whichever way you look at it is the same, to work with you to improve our services and prepare for the complicated and uncertain future of the NHS under the new proposals.
Whilst working through the registration forms we have received so far, a number contained interesting comments. Rather than wait till the group is completely setup we thought we would take this opportunity to address some of the issues raised.
Previous Patient Group:
“I hope this group will not fall by the wayside as we had some good members in previous group.”
This was one of the first comments we received from a member of the previous patient group. Firstly we would like to thank all those who were members of the previous group and to apologise that it “fell by the wayside”. It was a valuable resource and we gathered some excellent feedback, but problems with time constraints and limited availability on our part meant it was difficult to maintain a significant dialogue. We hope by making the group virtual and utilising the web we can reach a larger number of patients and not only gather feedback from across the practice population but also respond quickly.
New Appointment &Triage System Trial:
“We cannot see any point in altering the very good appointment system maybe we are wrong but only time will tell.”
Over the years we have done a number of patient surveys and gathered feedback. Often appointments come top as the thing people would like us to change. The problem has always been trying to strike the right balance between pre bookable and book on the day, long or short appointments, early or late. In the past we have tried different configurations and systems but often it has only been for one or a few of the partners, this has led to confusion and has not allowed for proper analysis. With this trial all the partners have adopted the new system and we plan to run it from August – December and then gather feedback from you the patients, our staff and doctors.
If you have experienced the new system and have any comments please let us know and they can be feed in to the discussions about whether to adopt this system permanently or try something else.
Other Projects:
We would really welcome feedback on a number of projects we’ve been working on to help us improve them for you.
Recently we changed our recall system for Chronic Disease management, the system is now based on a program which analyses patient records and creates a recall schedule tailored to the individual’s needs. The aim is to reduce the number of times patients are called in whilst ensuring all reviews are completed. We have received some feedback on the system and we’re planning a review in September to see if there are ways we could improve it. If you have had experience of this system and have any comments please let me know.
Another project has been the Castle Place Facebook page. Initially we were sceptical about introducing this but now it’s up and running it seems like a very easy platform on which to share information. If you have any ideas on improving this or any of our web based services we would greatly appreciate your input.
If you’re unsure about whether to join the patient group please feel free to get in touch either via email or by ringing the practice. We don’t intend to make the group a burden on you or us, we really want it to be a useful forum for us both, but for that to happen we need your help.
Once again thanks for your interest and we look forward to working with you in the future.
The Castle Place Management Team