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Following patient feedback and to mark World Autism Acceptance last week, North West Anglia Foundation Trust has been working in partnership with Mencap and VoiceAbility to reintroduce the use of Hospital Passports, to help improve patients with learning disabilities and autism’ experience when receiving care.

The Trust is encouraging patients and their supporters to bring their passports, which are confidential documents that have been created to ensure that support needs are documented and met. Information in the passports includes important medical information, the person’s personality and any reasonable adjustments that may be required such as a longer appointment time or written information in an easy read format.

The passports are important to view before medical intervention and stay with patients throughout their hospital journey, they are returned once the person has finished their hospital stay or appointment.

Maria Finch, Head of Patient Experience said: “It is important to ensure that all patients are at the very heart of every decision that is made and that no decision is made without them. Hospital Passports are an essential tool for patients to communicate their needs and who they are. By working in partnership with our patients, their representatives, and our partners to relaunch this initiative, we want to highlight the importance of individualised care and the message of ‘no decision about me, without me”

Pictured: Taite Tomlinson, Patient Experience Manager with Ward Manager, introducing a poster advertising Hospital Passports on wards. Also pictured: Taite Tomlinson and Alex Papp, Linguistic and Interpretation Service Coordinator pictured with outpatients team at Peterborough City Hospital.

To download a copy of the hospital passport and to view the guidelines of them, please click here