Listening to the patients’ voice: A collaborative conference between BGU and ULHT

Bishop Grosseteste University (BGU) co-hosted a Patient Experience Conference with United Lincolnshire Hospital NHS Trust (ULHT) at Lincoln City Football Club on Wednesday.

The conference brought together care providers across the county to reflect on “how we listen to our patients, carers and families” and to consider how these messages can enhance care provision.

The patient voice (and indeed the staff voice) and the content of the narrative is critical to service enhancement and ensures that needs and expectations are met. But what we really hear and what we do with this message is of equal importance and helps ensure that what patients are really saying is translated into practice change.

The conference was chaired by Dr Graham Basten, Head of School of Social Sciences at BGU, and Michelle Rhodes, Director of Nursing. National and local speakers all talked about the importance of effective engagement, challenging practice, listening rather than measuring. The small things actually mean the most and are often missed therefore we need to be effective in the way we listen and what we do with this information.