Patient Participation Group

What is a Patient Participation Group?

A patient particiaption group is a selection of patients and practice staff who meet at regular intervals (at least once every 3-months) to decide ways of making a positive contribution to the services and faciliaties by the practice to the patients.

What happens at a PPG meeting?

A PPG meeting is attended by Practice staff, practice patients and carers. The meetings are held in the Practice waiting room so ALL visiting patients can take part if needed. The meeting is managed by the Patient Chair. The meeting follows an agenda and the meetings usually last around an hour.

The Aims of the PPG and what they do.

The aim of the PPG is to work with their practice to provide practical support, to help patients take more responsibility for their own health and to provide strategic input and advice. PPGs are based on cooperation between the practice staff and patients.

To offer opinions in a constructive manner and to put forward ideas on behalf of other patients.
To give patients and practice staff the opportunity to discuss tropics of mutual interest in their practice.
To improve the provision of health care.
To encourage health education activities within the practice.
To improve communication between surgery, patients and the wider community about matters concerning the surgery and health in general.
To provide assistance in development of new services.
To encourage a spirit of self-help and support amongst patients to improve their health and social care.

What PPGs do not do?

A PPG meeting is not a forum to raise individual complaints - complaints cannot and will not be discussed at this level. ALL complaints or concerns must be directed to the Practice Manager in the first instance who will address these directly using the NHS complaints procedure.

A PPG meeting is not a forum to seek medical advice.

The following links may be of interest for ideas, tools or resources:

Further information on PPGs can be found at the National Association for Patient Participation website: https://napp.org.uk/

Healthwatch Derbyshire - Patient Participation Group Guide: https://www.healthwatchderbyshire.co.uk/reports-and-publications/patient-participation-group-guide

Virtual Patient Participation Group

We would like to hear your ideas about what is good about the practice and what doesn't work as well as it might so we can improve our service to you.

To help us with this, we have set up a Virtual Patient Participation Group (VPPG) so that you can have your say. We ask the members of this representative group some questions from time to time, such as what you think about our opening times or the quality of the care or service you receive.

We will contact you via email and keep our surveys succinct so it shouldn’t take too much of your time.