Patient Opinion has been plugging away at innovating in healthcare, using the web, and the power of web2.0. We started with hospitals, and have expanded to cover most of the health service – with our mental health service work spreading across England as we speak! And the Patient Opinion steam engine doesn’t stop there..
For a while, people have been asking us when we are going to cover social care services. Choice and financial considerations are become ever more of an issue in social care, with the continued roll out of individual budgets and personalisation. And with these changes, the need for real time service user feedback in social care is clearly growing.
Well, we are taking our first baby steps into this world, with a pilot project to explore how to extend our platform to residential nursing homes and care homes. Publishing online feedback about residential care homes is not straightforward. Residents are vulnerable, and often not able to speak for themselves. Telling a story about a hospital is fine, as you leave and probably won’t go back again for a while, but residents do not often leave care homes. This might mean we need to change how we think about creating an online tool for care homes.
According to the Department of Health, one in four of us will live in a care home at some point in our lives. That means these homes are part of our lives and our future. But try to find any feedback, or service user commentary on individual care homes online. Seriously, go and Google now, and I’ll buy you a pint if you find one story! This is a much needed service, for a sadly under discussed sector. And we think that Patient Opinion should have a try.
As always with Patient Opinion, we want to use the tools of the web to make it easy and immediate for service users and service providers to work together to make services better. But how best to do this in care homes? The answer might take us away from simple service user stories, and into a whole new online world… So stay tuned for our ideas on what new careworld might look like. In the meantime, if you have thoughts or inspirations about this – we would love to hear them!
Caring about care homes
Caring about care homes https://patientopinion.blob.core.windows.net/profile-pictures/d5861dea-2ca8-4cc5-85c3-ecbcc3a2685e.jpeg Care Opinion 0114 281 6256 https://www.careopinion.org.uk /content/uk/images/logos/co-header-logo-2020-default.pngUpdate from Care Opinion
Posted by Kate Ebbutt, Patient Opinion, on
Thanks for your feedback.
Response from Kate83 on 5 Oct 2009 at 22:14
Take a look at our first care home stories here: http://www.patientopinion.org.uk/opinions.aspx?nacs=springwood-ch
Response from DavidDr on 8 Oct 2009 at 00:18
Hi Kate, Great post, this is a really good idea, I hope it goes well. I was wondering if you still try to keep anonymity with this kind of work - someone described as a "98 year old women" would be quite easy to find, or is this only a problem for complaints? Springwood have done really well to get three posts in five days, I'm well impressed! Good luck with this, Dave
Response from DebbieH on 16 Oct 2009 at 00:47
Hi Kate, You owe me a pint! Seriously though, I totally agree with you it is vital that we share information about care homes and there is very little information available online, other than the basic name address and telephone number. However, 3 months ago I set up www.best-care-home.co.uk which lists only 3 star care homes in England. I encourage the homes to provide as much information as possible to help prospective residents and their families to make an informed shortlist before they trawl an area looking for the best home. I do recognise the limitations of the 3 star rating and so I have been encouraging members of the public - residents, relatives, visitors and staff to leave a comment on the site if they would personally recommend it. I have received hundreds of recommendations and as a result have had to set up a special search area that only lists care homes with personal recommendations. I appreciate this does not give a balanced view - the good and the bad comments, however I have taken the view, alongside legal advice, that there is enough negative publicity about care homes and it is about time we heard some positive news about them. Particularly as those that need to find a care home feel guilty enough as it is, so it's a form of reassurance that somebody else is recommending it. Some of the stories are very touching and heartfelt. I also believe it is important to address problems within care homes and have established a blog 'www.careandsharetogether.blogspot.com'. I am encouraging people to discuss the problems they experience, but also to try and suggest a remedy - so that we can move forward in trying to solve some of the problems. For example, in schools there is a parent teacher association, there is nothing similar that exists (to my knowledge) within care homes. An online association that encouraged relatives to work together to improve a situation surely makes sense? I would love to hear your comments. Kind regards Debbie Harris
Response from Kate83 on 26 Oct 2009 at 12:23
Thanks for the positive comments all! Dave - you're right, anonymity is a concern in this sector. In some ways it's similar to any small NHS service. It's something I'm constantly thinking about, and might mean we have a more stringent editorial policy covering what we publish for this bit of work. See some more care home posts here: http://bit.ly/2mvXB3 Debbie - Thanks for your interesting insight and thoughts. It's sparked a new blog post, which I'll put up in a minute. Great to hear from someone doing such positive work in this area. There are very understandable concerns about online feedback for care homes - do comment on my next post and tell me your thoughts. As for a parent teacher style relatives association - it's something I have in the pipeline. You are quite right! Getting relatives to work together to help improve homes makes perfect sense. Hopefully, the web can provide some tools to make that easier and more powerful than ever! Cheers! K