The Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) forums, which represent patients and the public in decisions about health, decided action needed to be taken after receiving a deluge of complaints from patients and their visitors on the cost of services provided by companies such as Patientline, Hospicom and Premier.
The forums will conduct surveys throughout hospitals in England to discover the true cost and quality of these services and to establish if patients and the public’s best interests are being served. They will also investigate whether hospitals allow patients the choice of using their mobile phone in certain areas of the hospital.
The launch of the Fair Talk campaign follows months of concerns over hospital bedside television and telephone services. These include the Department of Health announcing the creation of a review group into the price of hospital telephone charges and Patientline planning to hold an extraordinary general meeting, citing a loss of customer confidence in the service’s value for money and quality.
The forums will use the findings of the survey to feedback the views of patients and their families to the Department of Health’s review.
