Local people invited to have their say

Two local hospitals – the Royal London and Mile End – are looking for patient panels. No, they aren’t cladding their walls in calm wood: they’re looking for patients (old, new or potential) to join human panels to “raise and feed back patients’ comments and concerns to senior management and work with them to make improvements”.

Chair of The Royal London Hospital patient panel, Andrew Wood explained: “Volunteers on the patient panel will get involved in a wide range of activities across the hospital, for example leading hospital inspections, food tastings, ensuring that signage is easily understood, working with hospital staff on making the patient experience better and most importantly talking to patients and carers about their experience.

“Whether you are a hospital patient, a carer of someone who regularly uses health services or are a member of the public interested in getting involved, join us and have your say. We welcome interest from people of all ages and backgrounds – particularly from east London.”

The independent panels, each chaired by a local patient, will represent the views of patients and work in partnership with the Trust to improve services and patient experience across in each hospital in the Barts Health NHS Trust.

Deputy Chief Nurse at Barts Health NHS Trust, Tracey Carter said: “Engaging with our local communities to get involved with improving the services we provide is essential. This is a really exciting opportunity to further develop and build on our patient engagement.”

This is a voluntary role and you need to be able to meet for a couple of hours every one or two months, working in partnership with Barts Heath and other local patient groups to improve services. As the panels have not yet been created, there is scope to discuss ideas on how best to ensure the Trust is responsive to patient needs.

The Royal London Hospital patient panel: Chair, Andrew Wood. Email RoyalLondonPatientPanel@gmail.com or call 077 1048 6873

Mile End Hospital patient panel: Mohammed Khan, Chair. Email  RoyalLondonPatientPanel@gmail.com or call 079 0345 5078