Here at the Royal Orthopaedic Hospital we want to ensure each and every patient has the best experience whilst staying with us. For people with dementia, particularly when they are ill, hospital settings can be confusing, challenging and overwhelming. What happens in hospitals can have a profound effect on individuals and their families, not only in terms of their inpatient experience, but also their ongoing health and the decisions that are made about their future.
The Throne project has been launched to ensure our patient bathrooms provide the best environment for patients with dementia and with visual impairments. With dementia on the rise our hospital is actively taking measures to ensure we are dementia friendly at every point in a patients journey. With your help we can make this happen.
We are working with occupational therapists, nurses and doctors to ensure our toilets are as safe as possible. Just some of the things we are looking at doing when redeveloping our bathrooms will be:
- Having contrasting colour handrails and toilet seats helps patients to see key areas of the bathroom. This minimises falls and injury when using the bathroom.
- Opting for bins without a foot peddle, to ensure patients do not need to balance on one leg to open the bin.
- Clear signage to the patient bathrooms, with images. This helps support orientation and independence.
- Reduce risk of falling whilst patients are washing and dressing in bathroom, by providing rails for support and equipment.
This is a project we are working on this year! Each of our fundraising events this year will fund part of this project.
Please note, if we bypass our fundraising target for this appeal by the time your funds are received, your funds will be used for other patient experience improvement projects within the hospital. You will be notified if this is the case by a member of our fundraising team. Your gift will always be used to benefit the work of The Royal Orthopaedic Hospital.
