A HOSPITAL boss says complaints should be dealt with before the person making the complaint has even left the premises.

Harry Turner, chairman of Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, said this should be the ambition for county hospitals when he spoke at a meeting at the Alexandra Hospital in Redditch this week.

Mr Turner, speaking to the chief nursing officer, said: “If you get that confidence instilled in your senior teams, certainly matrons and sisters, they would be able to deal with the complaint before a person has even left the hospital.

“It seems like you’re building that confidence so they get to that complaint immediately before that person has left the hospital and, in some cases, put it right.”

The trust received 706 formal, written complaints in 2011/12, an 11.8 per cent increase on the previous year and one of the most common sources of complaint was lack of communication.

Helen Blanchard, chief nursing officer at Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, said staff were being encouraged to contact people who complain to discuss their concerns. Mrs Blanchard said: “We have had positive feedback from the staff who undertake it but they were very nervous about doing it.

“We have also had positive feedback from those who have received the phone call.

“It’s driving a better outcomes and better learning because they are more clearly able to understand what that patient experience was.”

Professor Julian Bion, an associate non-executive director, said evidence suggested that responding to a written complaint with a telephone call to say sorry within 48 hours helped resolve the issue but sometimes complaints required detailed analysis.

He said: “That initial communication is important.”