Nurses Day! - Birmingham Children's Hospital

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Listening to Patients and Families: Play & Activities
Play and activities are important for the wellbeing
of all children and young people who spend time
in hospital. They can also provide an essential
distraction from distressing aspects of care. It’s
important that activities, toys and equipment are
of good quality, are age appropriate, and easily
accessible. We categorise feedback about play and
activities as either ‘positive’ or ‘need to improve’.
Figure 8: Percentage of positive and ‘need to improve’ comments received
2011/12 & 2012/13
Play and Activities Feedback 2012/13
GOAL:
year on year
improvement in
positive
feedback
MEASURE:
% of positive feedback
compared to
‘need to improve’
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
How have we done?
54%
Positive
46%
The picture is very similar to last year. Having the
right toys, equipment and activities continues to
be really important to people who visit and stay
at our hospital. ‘Need to Improve’ comments can
include things we need to change or do better, like
provide more things to do for older children and
young people. These comments also include lots
of suggestions about different toys, games and
activities that children and young people would
really like to be available. It’s important that we
continue to monitor everything that people are
saying so we know where we need to do better
and understand what it is that children and young
people want and need.
Need to improve
53%
2011/12 2012/13
47%
I liked that the nurses gave
me colouring books and
pens when I was bored.
Although my child enjoyed
playing in the playroom it was
quite small and not easily
accessible if the patient is
on IVs etc, and have a dripstand
attached to them.
There was no adolescent
room like there is on
other wards.
l We will run a ‘promoting happy parenting’ course
to help parents with the challenges they face
when their children are in hospital.
l We will improve information about play and
activities so that children, young people and
families know what is available at the hospital.
l We will share our play and activity resources
better between wards to ensure that more
children and young people in the hospital have
opportunities use everything that is available.
l We will ask our volunteers to support
improvements in play and activities.
Listening to Patients and Families: Emergency Department Transfers
Until 2010/11 patients who came to our Emergency
Department were regularly transferred to other
hospitals after treatment because there were no
inpatient beds available. This was a really bad
experience for patients and their families so we
adapted our processes and procedures to ensure
this would change.
Figure 9: Patients transferred out of ED per month 2010/11 - 2012/13
GOAL:
all patients
who attend ED &
require
inpatient care
will be
admitted
MEASURE:
number of patients
transferred out of ED
per month
Number of patients transferred
60
50
40
30
20
10
How have we done?
We have continued to follow the processes we set
in 2010/11 and maintained our objective for most of
the year. In July 2012 one patient was transferred
out. This has been reviewed, and while the decision
to transfer was clinically right, there were processes
that could have been followed that would have
avoided the need for this transfer.
We will continue to monitor this indicator but we
will not report this as a quality priority in our next
Quality Account if we continue to perform well.
0
A M J J A S O N D J F M
2010/11
2011/12
2012/13
What are we doing to improve?
l We will be investing all our 2013/14 allocation
for improving patient experience by upgrading
the ward play areas.
l We have a new weekly Stay and Play group to
provide patients and siblings the opportunity to
play in a supportive environment. Feedback from
initial sessions is really positive.
l We are developing an activity book for children
and young people who come to the Emergency
Department to entertain and educate them
about what they might see and what might
happen to them while they are there. This is
linked to activities in schools to educate young
people about accessing health care.
l We are creating a Play Charter which will allow
us to set some specific, measurable objectives to
support improvements in play.
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