Striving for excellence in cancer services
Nearly nine out of ten people with cancer treated at Derriford Hospital rate their care as ‘excellent’ or ‘good’.
This is the finding of the latest National Cancer Patient Experience survey, which is run nationally and asks patients with cancer treated at all hospitals across the country about their care. More than 700 patients treated at Derriford Hospital responded to the survey.
Staff at Derriford Hospital pride themselves on being a centre of excellence for cancer care and the specialist cancer care teams are really pleased that the vast majority of their patients (88%) remain very satisfied with their care. Of those rated ‘excellent’ and ‘very good’, our UGI cancer and Urological cancer teams were rated in the top 20% of all Trusts, scoring 94%.
Derriford Hospital saw particular improvements in the number of patients feeling better informed about the purpose of tests, what would be done, their operations, their right to free prescriptions and who to contact if they are worried when out of hospital. It was also encouraging to see more families being given information to help care for their loves ones at home.
Sian DennisonLead Cancer Nurse, Sian Dennison, said: “Although there is much good news about the treatment options and survival rates for different cancers, cancer is still a very frightening word for people when they first receive a diagnosis.
“Cancer infiltrates every part of someone’s life: emotionally, physically, practically and financially and we have to treat the whole person and think about much more than disease-management.
“The way people respond to a diagnosis of cancer varies greatly from person to person and we have to respond to each individual’s needs.
“It is really heartening to know that our experienced, compassionate and highly skilled staff get it right for the vast majority of patients with cancer.
“When we don’t get it right, sometimes in very complex cases, it can make that patient’s experience more stressful and we always try to learn from that. We know we have more work to do, for example on making sure patients don’t receive conflicting information and that everyone receives a written assessment and care plan.
“We are constantly listening to and learning from the people we care for with cancer, making sure both their lives with or after the disease are as good as they can be, as well as their experience of our care.”
This survey was commissioned and managed by NHS England and is overseen by the Cancer Patient Experience Advisory Group. You can find the full survey results here: http://www.quality-health.co.uk/surveys/national-cancer-patient-experien...
