How best to engage patients in hospital service planning and improvement

Hospitals increasingly involve patients (or family members/care partners/consumers) in planning or improving hospital services; it is required by law and for hospital accreditation, and research shows that it improves patient and hospital outcomes. Little research has studied whether and how Canadian hospitals engage patients, or identified the most impactful patient engagement (PE) activities. This information is needed to ensure that the patient voice is actually used to improve what hospitals do, as this will lead to a better hospital experience and health care results for all patients. We will survey hospitals in Ontario (province with the largest number of hospitals) of various types (academic, general, cancer treatment and general rehabilitation) to learn about PE type (i.e. survey, committee member) and degree (inform, consult, partner). This data will be used by the research team to categorize hospitals as higher- and lower-performing for PE. We will then interview a selection of patients, clinicians and managers involved in different types of PE activities in hospitals that vary by type and region of Ontario to describe PE activities, perceived benefits, impacts it achieved, barriers they experienced, and suggested solutions to address barriers or enhance benefits/impacts. Their recommendations for ideal PE approaches and supports will be translated to performance measures of PE, which will be rated via online survey by a panel comprised of patients, physicians, nurses, managers and researchers from across Canada. The accumulated knowledge on the most feasible and impactful ways to achieve and evaluate PE in hospital planning and improvement will be shared with hospitals in Ontario, and with government policy-makers, hospital and health system leaders and researchers from across Canada so that hospitals in other provinces can optimize PE. Long-term, this could improve health service delivery, patient experiences and health among Canadians.