The Patient and Public Involvement Hero Award recognises clinical audits that engage with patients effectively. The award was judged on five criteria:
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Topics are aligned with patient priorities for improvement
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Evidence of engagement of patients, the public and carers during the planning stage
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Evidence of engagement of patients, the public and carers when reviewing findings
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Evidence of engagement of and collaboration with patients, the public and carers when planning implementation of quality improvement
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Evidence of patient, carer and public involvement in continuous improvement
What are some of the Youth Advocates’ projects?
This year, the Youth Advocates have:
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Created a new young person and parent/carer leaflet, with a checklist of questions to ask during clinic appointments,
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Presented at the RCPCH Annual Conference and the Epilepsy12 & OPEN UK Conference.
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Published a podcast about being diagnosed with epilepsy with Medicines for Children.
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Created a leaflet on School Individual Health Care Plans with a template to help everyone involved.
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Won the Richard Driscoll Memorial Award for outstanding patient and public involvement in November 2022.
Their priorities for 2023/24 are: Mental health support, independence and life skills, raising awareness, and clinic chats.
Some reflections from the Youth Advocates:
We work really hard and it’s serious, sometimes sad or difficult, discussions, but there is so much more – peer support, talking about our weekends, tips on epilepsy, fun, seagulls trying to break into the meeting, sharing what we’ve seen in the news about epilepsy or planning our new projects and activities.
We meet in person and online and most of that we are laughing and having fun.
We always have a mental health check in at the start of our meetings and a check out at the end.
Sometimes we play music really loud in the College (and forget it’s a weekday meeting so everyone hears it in the building?!)