Hospital email service helps keep contact with patients

FAMILIES can now share letters and photos via email to their loved ones in St Oswald’s Hospital, Ashbourne, to help keep in touch during the pandemic.

The new email service, which has been set up in response to the coronavirus restrictions, is aimed at visitors who are not allowed onto wards because of measures to help protect vulnerable patients and those caring for them from the virus.

The idea to create the #Letterstolovedones service came from Deborah Hall, head of patient experience and involvement at Derbyshire Community Health Services NHS Foundation Trust, which runs St Oswald’s Hospital.

She said: “There is a risk to the wellbeing of patients on our wards and their families because restrictions on inpatient visiting make communication and contact more difficult, just at a time when they may need it more than ever.

“The email service enables patients to receive letters and photographs more easily.

“It has taken a bit of organising to make sure it is safe and secure.

“All emails come to a central point so we can ensure messages are properly directed and so ward staff are not directly managing the email service on top of their vital clinical care.”

Relatives and friends of inpatients at St Oswald’s Hospital can email dchst.letterstolovedones@nhs.net attaching a letter and photographs.

They will also need to provide their patient’s date of birth, full name and say which ward they are on.