Edgecumbe Research helps Nuffield Health explore the perceptions of their consultants

The Client

Nuffield Health, the UK’s leading health charity, combines hospitals, clinics, fitness and wellbeing centres and diagnostic units into one complete healthcare service. The General Manager for Doctor Engagement at Nuffield Health Hospitals, Vivienne Heckford, was keen to understand how well Nuffield Health was meeting the needs of the 5000+ consultants who work in their hospitals. After receiving proposals from a number of survey suppliers, Vivienne decided that Edgecumbe Research with its experience of working in the healthcare sector and its user friendly reports, was best placed to support them with their survey.

employesurvey's Contribution

We worked closely with Vivienne and her team to understand their needs and how best to gather the data. It was important that the consultants perceived the survey as relevant so we conducted semi-structured telephone interviews with consultants of various specialisms who work in Nuffield Health hospitals and asked them their opinions about Nuffield Health. The main survey was designed based on the themes that emerged from the interviews. Because Edgecumbe Research is part of Edgecumbe, the leading HR consultancy working in the NHS, we knew the type of questions and vocabulary that would be appropriate for such a survey.

All consultants holding practising privileges with Nuffield Health were invited to complete the survey online and reminders were sent via email to boost the response rate. The survey contained close ended questions which helped to determine relative strengths and weaknesses and open ended questions which provided valuable insight into issues and potential solutions. Once the survey had closed, we drafted a report which detailed the responses for all respondents, high users, low users and users and non-users of other private facilities. We also prepared spidergrams so that, at a glance, one could easily compare the findings for these different groups. The results were presented to Vivienne and her team. Summary reports for the different Nuffield hospitals were also prepared.

This survey has now taken place in successive years allowing comparison of year on year results which has proved a valuable tool for identifying trends in consultant views.

The Outcome

The survey provided Nuffield Health’s Doctor Engagement Team with data on what their consultants value most about Nuffield Hospitals and any improvements they would like. Nuffield Health now knows what they need to focus on to ensure that their doctors continue to practise at Nuffield Health Hospitals. The survey also sent a very strong message to the consultants – that Nuffield Health cares about what they think and will act to better meet their needs.

Edgecumbe Research continues to support Nuffield Health with their annual consultant opinion survey and has helped them to monitor progress over the years.