Giving patients a say as wards look to talking cure for NHS ills

Diagnoses were given, treatment plans decided and consent forms signed. However, that was also a time when nurses also had much greater time to spend answering any worries and reassuring family members.

Pressure on already stretched NHS resources has never been greater and with frontline nursing staff taking on more responsibilities, many hospital wards often now seem to resemble conveyer belts.

It was a point made in the latest report published this week by the Government advisory body NHS Future Forum. It’s recommendations were simple enough. Along with calling on professionals to change how they use their time with an emphasis on prevention rather than cure, it also levelled criticism at the tendency to treat patients at arm’s length.

“Medicine is changing. Every year brings clinical and technological advances, new drugs and new treatments,” said Professor Steve Field in an open letter to the Secretary of State for Health Andrew Lansley. “The world is shrinking. In an age where people access information at the click of a button, the NHS cannot                              remain in the information dark ages.

“People are changing. Their expectations from the NHS are always increasing and they rightly expect a greater role in making decisions during their care. It is therefore critical that we hard wire the declaration of ‘no decision about me, without me’.”

Identifying problems within the NHS is easy. Providing solutions which meet financial constraints, less so. However, the report also identified charities like CLIC Sargent as key to bridging the gap between patients and doctors.

Set up in 2005, as the result of a merger of two other charities, the organisation specialises in supporting children with cancer and their families, but NHS Future Forum believes its way of working could provide a model for other areas of care. As well as providing specialists nurses both in hospital and at home, CLIC Sargent also places an emphasis on involving the wider community.

Last summer the charity launched a volunteer project based at Leeds General Infirmary Six months on the initiative has recruited 27 volunteers who to date have donated 488 hours of their time by working directly with children and young people on wards as well as supporting patients and family members at home.

“The project has provided a wide variety of people – from students to retired professionals – with a real opportunity to support families and make a difference to their lives and gather some invaluable experience along the way,” says CLIC Sargent social work assistant Alistair Brooks. “The team at LGI have said that having more helping hands makes a huge difference to their day to day work and having that extra support means that we can aim to help more families.”

Elsewhere, the charity’s social workers take the pressure of families not just by explaining their child’s treatment or helping them fill in forms, but also by allowing them to talk.

“Every week I attend a parents’ tea group,” says one social worker. “It’s a place they can talk informally. They don’t have to say anything in particular, it’s mainly just an opportunity to get away from the relentless responsibilities of the ward.”

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