🐻 Stories, Stickers & Smiles: CO Bear Visits the RHCYP! 🐻

It’s been a busy few weeks for our Patient Experience Team here at NHS Lothian! We  recently spent a brilliant day at the Royal Hospital for Children and Young People, encouraging patients to share their stories about their time in hospital with help from Care Opinion Bear.

Want to know how we got on? Take a look below! 👇

CO Bear Takes Over the Royal Hospital for Children & Young People!

Our team had an absolute blast! Our mission was to encourage more children and young people to share their stories through Care Opinion. We came armed with stickers, leaflets and lots of toys, and had a great turn out. We also brought along some tablets, so patients could share their stories there and then via kiosk mode.

We've been planning the event for a while now, and were joined on the day by both Megan from the Play Team and Danielle from Care Opinion. With toys, Bear stickers, and our very popular CO Bear colouring sheets (designed by our very own team!), the outpatients waiting area quickly turned into a hub of fun! So many parents thanked us for helping keep their wee ones entertained whilst waiting for appointments. Honestly, we’re still not sure who enjoyed it more, them or us!

For those who couldn’t make it down to the outpatient area, we took the fun to the wards, handing out colouring sheets and Care Opinion information for parents and families. Staff on the wards were fantastic - encouraging children to share their stories. Every member of staff we met showed real enthusiasm for the project and it was great to see lots of CO Bear posters in the wards too.

Of course, the star of the show was our CO Bear colouring pages. The kids threw themselves into their drawing, adding imaginative touches we’d never have thought up ourselves. The atmosphere was relaxed and full of creativity - and it opened the door for families to chat with us about their experiences in a natural way. We also spent time speaking with patients and their families in the waiting area who weren't as keen to take part, making sure they still got information about CO and how to share their own experience, should they wish.

Can your team help us reach 500 stories?

As of writing this blog, the RHCYP has an amazing 489 stories published on Care Opinion - how brilliant is that!?

If you'd like to find out more about becoming a responder, or have any questions about how Care Opinion can be used within your department, please get in touch with the Patient Experience Team. We'd be delighted to help!

So… which services are topping the leaderboard?

Drumroll please! 🥁

🥇 Play Services - 125 stories! 👏

🥈 Accident & Emergency Department - 92 👏 stories!

🥉 Castle Mey Ward - 40 stories! 👏

A massive well done !! Fantastic work all round! 🎉

Want to see how your own service is doing? Just run a Lilypad visualisation on Care Opinion. 

Kind Words - Big Impact! 👇

We’ve seen so many lovely stories shared about our staff and services at the RHCYP, and our team has awarded 55 staff recognition certificates so far, to staff mentioned positively by name in a story!

Here are just some of the lovely things patients and their families have been telling us about the RHCYP👇

"Special shouts to Katy in pre-op, Aisling play therapist and Amanda and Summer in post-op. Keep doing what you do, you are awesome!!" Read the full story here

"She is always up to date with our daughter’s care, even though she now won’t be seen by cardiology for another couple of years and she must have many, many other families on her caseload. She always offers to help in ways that involve going out of her way. It makes a huge difference as a parent to feel like your child has been truly cared about and that level of thoughtfulness is really so appreciated when your child is a patient." Read the full story here 

"My physiotherapists where very effective in getting me up and running again, and had great personalities and were very friendly. It didn't just feel like they where being paid to help me, it felt like they really wanted to see me make some progress. It was great getting moving again after Spinal Fusion." Read the full story here

Did you know that children & young people can tell their story on Care Opinion with help from Bear? Right from the homepage, there’s a special option designed just for them, using child‑friendly language to make it easier to talk about their experiences of health and care. There’s extra guidance for adults too, so families can feel supported every step of the way.

We’ve got some brilliant Bear‑themed resources - posters, cards, and stickers - to help spark conversations and encourage feedback. Even better, if you’re feeling creative, you can design your own using the Care Opinion Bear logo suite!

Want to know more? Just get in touch with the Patient Experience Team - we’d love to help you bring Care Opinion Bear into your work!

The Care Opinion journey so far...

Care Opinion gives staff the opportunity to respond directly to patient feedback online, with training, guidance and support available from both the Patient Experience Team and Care Opinion. It's simple to do and a great way to engage with patients!

Here at NHS Lothian, we use Care Opinion stories as a way to celebrate good practice and staff mentioned in stories, as well as learning from when things don't go so well, and showing what changes we're making as a result. It's never about punishment, it's about our commitment to listening, learning and ongoing improvement.

Care Opinion sits outside of our official complaints process, and can even help people share their experiences and recommendations without having to make one.

There's so many other great features of using CO:

⭐Reporting and visualisations platform (great for newsletters and social media, also for anyone working in governance and reporting).

⭐Easy way to record changes to practice, directly from patient feedback

⭐Evidence for revalidation

⭐Ongoing webinar training programme

And much more...

Stories published on Care Opinion are moderated first to make sure that staff are treated fairly, you can find out more about this process here.

Get in touch with the Patient Experience Team if you'd like more information!