Our trust is implementing the Patient Wellness Questionnaire as part of the wider Call for Concern or as its also known, Martha's Rule. This is a vital patient safety initiative that gives healthcare professionals, patients and their families a clear pathway to raise concerns about rapid deterioration.
What is the Patient Wellness Questionnaire?
The Patient Wellness Questionnaire involves nursing colleagues asking, listening, recording and acting on any changes in condition reported by patients or their loved ones.
The two questions are ‘How are you feeling?’ and ‘Do you feel any better or worse compared to yesterday?’. From the score generated the nursing team can follow a decision-making/escalation matrix to ensure the score is acted on appropriately.
The aims of the Patient Wellness Questionnaire are to:
1. Detect deterioration early
2. Improve patient experience
What will happen?
If you or a loved one are in hospital, you will notice that our nursing teams are now formally recording when they ask patients how they are feeling and how that compares to the day before.
This enables our teams to escalate any concerns at the earliest opportunity and monitor accordingly.
Please note that If a patient is truly unable to answer, then a relative or appropriate advocate can answer based on their knowledge of the patient.