Published 4 November 2009, doi:10.1136/bmj.b4529
Cite this as: BMJ 2009;339:b4529

News

Most patients rely on their own experiences to choose hospitals, shows survey

Zosia Kmietowicz

1 London

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

More than half the patients (56%) who recalled being offered a choice of hospitals to be referred to by their GP say that they based their decision on their own experience rather than quality measures such as those published on the NHS Choices website, a survey has found.

The survey, which was conducted by the health services charity the King’s Fund, shows that half the 2181 people who returned a postal questionnaire recalled being offered a choice of hospital or treatment centre.

GPs were asked to start offering patients a choice of hospitals for their outpatient appointments three years ago as part of the government’s choice agenda. To test patients’ perspectives on choice the King’s Fund sent out questionnaires between March and June this year to 5997 patients who booked an outpatient appointment in January 2009 at eight NHS trusts. The response rate was 36%.

But rather than consulting official . . . [Full text of this article]


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