The percentage of people who recall being offered a choice of hospital remains at just one under in two patients, according to the latest National Choice Survey.
The Department of Health’s July survey of 93,000 patients shows that 46% remembered being offered a choice of hospital. Provisional findings for September show that 46% of patients recalled a choice conversation. The figure for May was 45%.
Approximately 50% of appointments are now made through Choose and Book. The latest choice survey found that 31% of appointments were booked after patients telephoned an appointments line, 19% were booked on screen by a GP or practice staff member and 4% were booked over the internet.
A further 36% of patients were contacted by the hospital after their GP sent a referral by letter. These figures also show little change since May.
Other key findings in the 14th survey, conducted by Ipsos MORI, are that 47% of patients were aware before they visited their GP that they had a choice of hospital, up from 45% in May. In addition, 66% of patients were able to go to the hospital they wanted – although this rose to 88% for patients who said they had been offered a choice of hospital.
Half the patients (49%) who were offered choice said they used their GP as a source of information when choosing their hospital, with a third (32%) saying they used their own experience or that of friends and family. A booklet about choice was used by 8% patients, whilst 5% used the NHS Choices website.
Hospital cleanliness and low infection rates were selected by most often as an important factor when choosing a hospital.
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