Patient Experience Definition (Hansard, 19 April 2004)

§ Mr. Burstow
To ask the Secretary of State for Health if he will estimate the cost of the research to develop the Patient Experience Definition. [162425]

§ Ms Rosie Winterton
The total cost of the project to explore the overall experience of patients using national health service services, was £39,722.60. One element of the project was the production of a Patient Experience Definition.
216W

§ Mr. Burns
To ask the Secretary of State for Health what proportion of written questions for answer by his Department on a named day received a holding answer in the period between State Opening in(a) November 1998, (b) November 1999, (c) December 2000, (d) November 2002 and (e) November 2003 and the last day of February in the following year; and of those questions, what proportion received a substantive answer (i) within five parliamentary sitting days, (ii) within six to 10 parliamentary sitting days, (iii) within 11 to 20 parliamentary sitting days and (iv) after more than 20 parliamentary sitting days. [159997]

§ Ms Rosie Winterton
[holding answer 10 March 2004]: Significant changes have been made to the parliamentary section and procedures for answering right hon. and hon. Members' questions within the Department since March 2002. A new data base was introduced in October 2002 to help improve the process.
The available information is shown in the table.
Prior to October 2002 information from the previous database does not readily provide the further analysis sought, which could be obtained only by a manual count which would incur a disproportionate cost.
The Patient Experience Definition articulates the entirety of the desired experience from a patient perspective when wing NHS services. Traditionally service delivery has focused on the physical aspects of patient care and has given much less emphasis to patients' emotional needs. The research has clearly identified that for patients a good emotional experience is critical to their overall satisfaction with the NHS. The definition enables both the Department and the NHS to have a more complete understanding of the patient experience when developing and delivering patient-centerd services in the future.