Hospital Discharge for Older People
This project follows a period of consultation with a number of partners, including Age UK, Crossroads Care, the Royal Sussex County Hospital, the Food Partnership, and the Brighton & Hove Clinical Commissioning Group.
Trained Healthwatch volunteers are visiting 11 areas of the Royal Sussex County Hospital. They are interviewing patients over the age of 65+ about the information they have received on what happens after hospital. We are asking them about their expectations of the type of care they will receive after leaving and where they anticipate going (to a care home, temporary rehabilitation, own home or other residence).
With consent our volunteers will visit the patient one month after discharge. We will ask how things worked (or did not) once they got home (own home or other). Did the patients feel they were discharged at the right time and with the right information? Were their expectations met, with regard to their care after leaving hospital or not?
To support these interviews, we have written an online survey for those able to access. This is aimed at any person aged 65 years or older and who has had experience of being discharged from Royal Sussex County Hospital in 2018. We are also seeking family members/carers of a person who meets these criteria to also complete the survey.
If you are a patient or a family member of a patient, we would love to hear from you. Please complete the survey below to tell us about your experience.
We are also interviewing carers and family members, and hospital and community-based staff. We aim to build up a picture of the discharge process, from a number of different angles.
We hope to gather information on what goes right, what doesn’t and therefore what improvements could be made to the discharge process.
Watch this space for updates in the next newsletter and key findings later this year.
In the meantime, a special thank you goes to all the volunteers who are putting time and effort into the hospital and home visits.
To complete the survey click here: Hospital Discharge Survey
Please note the survey is now closed.