A Big Thank You
We conducted our NHS Foundation Trust public consultation exercise between Tuesday 3 January 2012 and Wednesday 28 March 2012. Our theme for the consultation was 'Join us – Together we can Make a Difference'.
You can click here to download the full plans we consulted on.
What We Did
We held 35 meetings with our staff and their representatives and 19 meetings with our colleagues from other organisations, partners and the public, including meetings with Plymouth, Cornwall and Devon Overview and Scrutiny panels. We wrote to 5,000 existing members, 3,000 randomly selected recent patients and our 20 governors-in-waiting, inviting them all to read our plans for the future, tell us what they think and get involved. We contacted GPs, other healthcare providers, MPs, libraries, special interest groups and others to try to involve as many people as we could.
What You Did
Many of you did join in and give us your views or sign up to be a member for free. We would like to say a big ‘thank you’ for taking the time to tell us what you think and for those of you who have signed up to get more involved in members, thank you for giving us your ongoing support. In total we received 1790 responses. The large majority of these were really supportive and some great suggestions were made.
Listening to What You Said and Acting on it
Overall, there is strong support for our vision and direction of travel and our proposed new name: University Hospital Plymouth NHS Foundation Trust. A sense of caution has also been expressed, particularly around the need to ensure changes to healthcare provision are done in the right way, ensuring that the quality of care patients receives remains paramount. As a result of what we have heard, we have changed the make-up of our Council of Governors to ensure that:
• one governor acts as a Children and Young People’s Champion
• we have increased the number of elected public Governors for Devon and Cornwall to four each
• there is provision for the University of Exeter to be represented as well as Plymouth University
• there is a reduction in the number of appointed commissioners and inclusion of a representative from community healthcare providers/third sector organisations
Now our challenge is to continue to grow our membership and ensure that the plans we have in place to truly involve people from the local community become a reality.
We are confident that with the continued support of our staff and our committed governors-in-waiting and members, we can do this.
Find Out More
Join Us
Get involved in helping us improve our services for patients and speaking up for their many different and diverse needs. Become a member by completing the online membership form.
Please join us as a Member - together we can make a difference