Patient and carer panel

Listening to patient voices to improve our communications

We want to make sure our patient information, guidance and communications are as clear and easy to understand as possible. To help make our communications better, we are setting up a patient and carer panel of around 15 people from our local community to share their feedback and views on our draft information. Their insights will help us check that our letters, leaflets and other communications are straightforward and understood.

Who can join?

We welcome interest from anyone. We’re looking for people from a wide range of backgrounds and lived experiences that have ideally been a patient at our Trust within the last two years. You don’t need to have any previous experience or knowledge of healthcare.
We will ask members to read and reflect, about twice a month on some materials and we anticipate this will take about four hours each month. We will email documents and members either feedback via email, phone calls or online meetings with other members. Sometimes we might ask you to come to our hospitals and feedback on the building, facilities and signage.

To apply please email us: imperial.involvement@nhs.net.

Why your input matters

When patients don’t understand what we’ve said or written, things can go wrong. It can lead to poor care and delays and we want to work with this group to help avoid that happening. By sharing your views, you’ll help us improve safety and make the patient experience better for everyone. Feedback from this group will make a real difference to patient care. In the past we have learnt a lot from similar groups that we had and in creating this group we will build on this.

What it will involve

Joining the group:

• After your request to join the group via email imperial.involvement@nhs.net, we will have a brief online meeting with you to hear about why you want to get involved and what you’re interested in. This also gives you a chance to make sure you want to be on the panel.
• We will then confirm if you will join the patient and carer panel and share specific details about what it will involve. To take part you need an email address and access to a computer or device with a camera.

Reading and reflecting:

• About twice a month we would email some draft letters or leaflets and ask you to read and think about how clear and effective they are. If you are too busy you can tell us you can’t do it.
• We will reimburse people for their time at the London Living Wage rate of £14.80/hour. For each project, we will share how long we expect the activity to take and the maximum amount of reimbursement.

Sharing your feedback:

• You can either feedback via email or a phone call. We may also have a short group meeting or ask you to feedback on the material. You can say what does and doesn’t work and make suggestions to improve it.
• To take part in any online meetings you’ll need to be able to contribute to meetings, have your camera on and be in a quiet space where you can easily hear what others are saying and also speak.