Training is being offered to people working in voluntary, community and social enterprise (VCSE) organisations in Gloucestershire, to support the roll out of a new way of measuring people’s satisfaction with their mental health and wellbeing.
The new measure is called DIALOG and it enables patients to think about their lives in terms of 11 questions. Patients rate their satisfaction with eight aspects of their life and three treatment aspects on a 7-point scale. DIALOG provides a score for quality of life and a score for treatment satisfaction.
Why is Dialog being introduced?
There is a national recommendation for mental health services to use Patient Routine Outcome Measures regularly by NHS England. Here’s why:
• It’s important to allow us to be more responsive to people’s needs, reduce barriers and improve access to services.
• It supports the direction of treatment and allows people to create their own solutions
• It helps us understand people’s preferences and focus on their chosen goals
Also… Experts by Experience found the scale gave them a tool to express what is important to them. Staff also said the tool was simple to use and provided structure to a conversation.
What does DIALOG look like?
We have produced a leaflet which explains more about DIALOG and explains the scale more fully: DIALOG-leaflet.pdf (ghc.nhs.uk)
An Easy Read version of the leaflet is in production.
Who is the training for?
DIALOG is currently being rolled out across Adult Mental Health Care teams in Gloucestershire Health and Care, GP surgeries in the Forest & Gloucester City and Social prescribers in Cheltenham with plans to expand across the whole of Gloucestershire. As part of the new Locality Community Partnership meetings, any VCSE member will need to bring a DIALOG questionnaire completed by the person they want to discuss,
How do we access training?
Please email chloe.sanders@ghc.nhs.uk for more information. You can also attend some brief training (1.5 hours including Q&A) on the 20th and 27th September to help you use DIALOG as a patient routine outcome measure.
