Work with us

What we offer

The Patients Association has six decades of experience of working with patients from all walks of life and supporting organisations to partner with patients and communities to improve services.

We are dedicated to supporting patient organisations to support their engagement with patients and carers.

Our work with our partners is award winning. In July 2023 we were awarded a Gold standard in the Ovid Patient Partnership Index for the AMR Patient Shield Project. This project co-produced resources for patients and carers of things to consider when deciding about antibiotics.

Learn more about our work in four key areas with healthcare organisations and read about some of our recent projects in the sections below. We offer services in:

Patient Engagement

Training and Development

Patient Support

Understanding Patient Perspectives.

If you would like to learn more about how your patient, carer and community engagement work can benefit from working with us, contact our Head of Programmes, Shivani Shah, for more information on our projects and partnerships [email protected]

Training programmes tailored to your organisation's needs

We are experts in supporting organisations to integrate shared decision making and patient partnership into their cultures. Organisations that embrace shared decision making and partner with their service users, are more likely to offer patient-centred care, and increase patient engagement, satisfaction and outcomes.

Our training programmes are tailored to meet your organisation’s needs. We work with organisations to improve how staff communicates with patients, support the diversification of patient groups, and improve patient satisfaction, among other things.

Contact our Head of Programmes, Shivani Shah, for more about bespoke training packages [email protected]

"We have been working with the Patients Association now for nearly a year to support the development of GP practice patient groups in Herts and West Essex. I have found the Patients Association to be extremely responsive and easy to work with. The project manager has developed a work plan in partnership with the organisation and regularly provides updates and development suggestions.
"I would absolutely recommend working with Patients Association."
Heather Aylward, Public Engagement Manager
Herts and West Essex Integrated Care Board

Latest

Developing GP practice patient groups

We've been working with patient participation groups in Hertfordshire and West Essex for more than a year now. In this workshop, the team review progress to date.
Patients Association statement on planned strike action by junior doctors

Festive season strikes will strike fear into patients waiting for care. We urge both parties to return to talks.
Understanding changes in primary care: your wider general practice team

In this webinar, we’ll look at some of the new professionals patients may see in general practice, such as social prescriber, paramedic and mental health practitioner.
Changes in primary care, understanding the role of the reception team

We had a great panel join us to talk about the plan to recover access to primary care and talk about the new reception team.

Support for ICSs to embed patient partnership in your work

We bring genuine patient engagement and expertise to our collaborations with healthcare organisations. We can support your efforts to work in partnership with patients and communities.
Let us help you understand the patient point of view

We can help organisations understand patients’ experiences and the impact of healthcare on their day-to-day lives.
How we support patients

We empower patients to navigate the complexities of the healthcare system with confidence.
How we facilitate patient engagement

We facilitate partnerships between patients and carers and health and care organisations ranging from the public sector through to healthcare companies, to ensure patients' voices are heard and valued.
A guide to establishing a GP practice patient group

The Herts and West Essex project developed a step-by-step guide to setting up a patient practice group. Watch the video and download the slides.
Transforming outpatient services for patients

We supported NHS England to improve patients’ experience of outpatient services, focusing on GP referrals to hospitals. The patient panel and focus group we brought together enabled NHS England to hear the perspectives of diverse communities and work with them to craft recommendations to improve referrals for all patients.
Hospital Food Review 2020

The Patients Association ran a survey of patients asking them what they thought of hospital food. We were commissioned by the Department of Health and Social Care to do this and the perspectives were used in the Hospital Food Review in 2020. The report provided recommendations for improvement, emphasising the importance of meal choices, quality, and the impact of food on patients' overall hospital experience.
Switching to Biosimilars

If you you're asked to switch to a new biosimilar medicine, we have worked with patients, clinicians and pharmacists to create resources to help you decide what’s best for you. There are also resources for healthcare professionals to better engage patients in making decisions about whether to swtich. We were also by three pharmaceutical companies, which supported this work.
Improving complaints

We have supported several NHS Trusts to improve how they deal with patient complaints, including Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Homerton University Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. We work with Trusts’ patient experience leads to and complaints managers to improve patients’ experience of making a complaint.