Episode 14: Leading the Change - Supporting Carers in Hospital

In this episode of Nina's Law: Let's Talk Care, we’re joined by Tanya, Head of Patient Experience and Engagement at Great Western Hospital, as well as the Carers Lead, where she works closely with unpaid and paid carers to ensure they are recognised, supported, and empowered within the hospital setting.

Tanya shares how their team is leading the way in improving the experience for both patients and carers, recognising the vital role carers play and making sure they have the support, information, and access they need to make a difference.

We explore the practical changes being implemented, the importance of listening to carers’ voices, and how collaboration between staff and families can lead to better outcomes for patients.

This conversation offers a hopeful and forward-thinking look at what hospital care can and should be, where carers are not just included, but valued as essential partners in care.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Right, hi everyone, and Nina here from Nina's Law Let's Talk Care, episode 14 now, I believe. So I've got the best interview. Well, they're already very good, but this one is one I've been waiting for for a long time, and I'm so excited to present Tanja from the Great Western Hospital, and she will explain more about what the best hospitals are doing now. Um, please explain more.

SPEAKER_01 0:40

Hi Nina. So as you say, I'm Tanja and I'm the head of patient experience and engagement at the Great Western Hospital. Um, and I'm also the carers lead. So a lot of the work that I do is to support unpaid carers, and that's about recognising their expertise and working in partnership with them. So if they normally care for somebody at home, we want to continue that where appropriate, and we want to involve them and ensure that they can contribute to the patient's care if they obviously wish to continue doing that. We also want to make sure that they feel fully supported to do that and that we are recognising, as I say, their expertise. We try to signpost them to external organisations as well to make sure that they are getting all of the advice and the information and the support that they need out in the community. So we'll work closely with organisations such as Swindon Carers Together and Carers Together Wiltshire and other specialist agencies. As part of our sort of support for carers in the hospital, we have a carer support passport, and that really aids our staff working in partnership with people. So it's a document for us to record the level of care and the support that those carers want to continue while their cared for person is in hospital. It does also come with things like concessions on parking and refreshments if they meet the criteria, but the focus is really about on that partnership working. We also have recliner chairs, so if somebody wants to stay overnight with their cared for person, they can do that. The chairs fully recline out into a sort of a bed so they can have that next to the bedside and be there if they wish to. We've also recently opened an information hub which has got a real focus on carers and on discharge as well. So it's an opportunity for people to go and get information, advice, signposting, and if it's just to go and have a chat and a coffee, then that's absolutely fine. If it's to pick up some leaflets, but the hub is located down in the uh Chirwell unit in the Brunal Treatment Centre.

SPEAKER_00 3:03

Okay, so this is also for paid-for carers as well, isn't it?

SPEAKER_01 3:08

Yeah, absolutely. So, although, as I say, I mainly have been my work has focused on unpaid carers, it does also apply to paid carers and we want to support them in the same way.

SPEAKER_00 3:19

That's great, that is really good. So, for pay um carers that come from an agency as such, how would they would they speak to the head of the ward? Let them know.

SPEAKER_01 3:33

Absolutely, yeah. So we've we've recently written into one of our trust policies. So we have a policy which is around admission, discharge, and transfer, um, and we've added to that recently to make it um explicitly clear to our staff that it is fine to work in collaboration with paid carers where appropriate. So if somebody comes into hospital and they normally have a carer in the community and that agency or private carer, whoever is able to continue that and they want to do that, and that's appropriate for the agency, then we would support that. It's important to say that the trust does retain overall legal and clinical responsibility for the patient while they're in our care, but that doesn't prevent us from working together with appropriately trained external carers, um, particularly if they are delivering certain elements of care that they would routinely deliver in the community.

SPEAKER_00 4:27

So, like exercises, for example, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 4:30

It might be exercises, it might be specialist bowel care, it might be catheter care, it could be it could be any sort of physical um aspect or even psychological aspect. Um but those carers obviously know the patient best, um, and the patient knows the carers best, and that that is obviously a therapeutic relationship, and where possible we would want to support that continuing, which is amazing because this is what every hospital really should be doing.

SPEAKER_00 5:02

You really are at the forefront of not the first pioneers doing it. I don't know, there are other hospitals that do do this, and I'm very sure there are, but there are many that don't, and that's why so many people have contacted me on thechange.org saying how poor things have been in the past. Various different hospitals everywhere else around the country, and they're begging out for help and they don't know where to get the help from. And I'm like, Well, this is why I'm doing Lina's law, I want Lena's Law to go in place, so it's a must for every hospital to allow carers to go in all over the country, and also a part for the paid-for carers, I need it in their contract that when their client goes into hospital, they will automatically continue to care for them in hospital when they go there. So it's it's a twofold thing I'm doing.

SPEAKER_01 6:05

Yeah, absolutely it is. I can I can see that, and like I say, from our point of view, it's about us making sure that um we're we have confirmation of that carer's competency, that the patient is happy and gives consent, and that we retain that clinical oversight um and overall responsibility for the patient's care. But that working in partnership um is really important, you know, from everybody's point of view.

SPEAKER_00 6:30

100%. Well, Tanya, I've brought you some lovely flowers to say thank you for all of us for allowing this to happen. They're so gorgeous, Nina. Thank you so much. No, no, no, this is from all of us to say thanks because we're so happy that we can have the care in Swindon, but this needs to be everywhere, it really does.

SPEAKER_01 6:50

They're absolutely beautiful, thank you. That's really kind of you. Absolutely lovely. No, thank you.

SPEAKER_00 6:55

Love flowers, they're beautiful. Well, anyway, thank you so much. I think this will be so great for everybody to hear what you guys are doing. I mean, it's amazing. I think everybody should be aware that you're doing it. You are at the forefront the pioneers of letting care happen, continue to happen in the hospital. Everybody should do this. If they don't already, I'm sure there are some, like I say, that do, but there are many that don't. So thank you so much for coming today. Thank you.