Suggestions and Complaints

Our aim is to provide the highest possible standard of care and service to our patients. When patients or their partners offer praise or criticism we listen carefully. We endeavour to use all positive or negative feedback in such a way to continually improve our service further. In the rare event when a complaint is made, we try to deal quickly with any problems that may occur. Should you find that you have a complaint or concern about the service you have received from a member of the Avon Vasectomy Service, please let us know. If your problem cannot be sorted out immediately and you wish to make a complaint, please let us know as soon as possible. The quicker the problem is identified the easier it is to establish the facts.

Positive feedback is always welcome and is passed-on to the member of staff concerned.

HOW TO COMPLAIN

We hope that most problems can be sorted out quickly and easily, often at the time they arise and with the person concerned.

If you remain unhappy and your problem cannot be sorted out in this way and you wish to make a complaint, we would like you to let us know as soon as possible, preferably in writing addressed to Dr D L Boone - ideally within a matter of days if at all possible to enable us to investigate and establish what happened more easily.

We take all comments and complaints seriously and will handle them in confidence.

We will acknowledge your complaint within three working days, and aim to have looked into your complaint within ten working days of the date when you raised it with us. We shall then be in a position to offer you an explanation or a meeting with the people involved. When we look into your complaint, we shall aim to:

Impartially find out what happened and what went wrong
offer a complete and clear explanation and make sure you receive an apology where this is appropriate
identify what we can do to make sure the problem does not happen again.
We may suggest a meeting to talk through the issues and attempt to resolve them.

COMPLAINING ON BEHALF OF SOMEONE ELSE

Please note that we keep strictly to the rules of medical confidentiality. If you are complaining on behalf of someone else, we have to know that you have their permission to do so. A note signed by the person concerned will be needed unless they are incapable (because of illness) of providing this.

An independent review

Alternatively, if you are an NHS patient you can raise the matter with your South Gloucestershire CCG. You may access the Patient Advice and Liaison Service (PALS) to assist you with your complaint. This is called local resolution, and most cases are resolved at this stage. PALS may be contacted as follows:

Tel: 0800 073 0907 or 0117 947 4477
Suite 15, Corum 2 Corum Office Park Warmley South Gloucestershire BS30 8FJ

COMPLAINING TO THE OMBUDSMAN

We hope that, if you have a problem, you will use our practice complaints procedure as detailed above. We believe that will give us the best chance of putting right whatever has gone wrong and an opportunity to improve our practice. If you are dissatisfied with the result of our own investigation you have the right to refer to the Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman whose contact details are:

The Parliamentary and Health Service Ombudsman
Millbank Tower
Millbank
London SW19 4QP
Helpline 0345 015 4033