Supporting patients and families

During this time, we understand how difficult it is to be unable to visit loved ones in hospital and the significant impact that this can have. Our staff will help you keep in touch throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, and can provide support to our patients, their relatives and carers in a number of ways.

Our staff are here to support families to keep in touch with their loved ones while they are in hospital. Where possible, we encourage you to contact your loved one directly by mobile phone or tablet. However, where this is not practical, you can contact the ward directly via the Royal and Broadgreen Hospitals ward list or via the ward list widget on the landing page of Aintree Hospital's website.

For patients who may not be able to maintain contact with their family and friends through mobile phone or video calls like FaceTime, our staff can assist with arranging Virtual Visiting. This involves our staff supporting patients to make a video call to their loved ones using one of our tablets.

Please contact staff on the ward if you would like to arrange a Virtual Visiting appointment. Our Patient Experience and Engagement Team can assist with any queries regarding Virtual Visiting and can be contacted at patientexperience@liverpoolft.nhs.uk

In addition, our Volunteer Services Teams offer additional services to support our patients and their families. To arrange any of the following support, please contact:

• Royal Liverpool and Broadgreen Hospitals: VolunteerRLB@liverpoolft.nhs.uk
• Aintree Hospital: VolunteerAUH@liverpoolft.nhs.uk

Knitted hearts initiative

A small knitted heart can be given to the patient, and they can nominate a friend or family member to receive a matching heart. This heart will then be packaged and sent to the patient’s loved one with their personalised message.

Send a Teddy initiative

A small teddy/teddies can be given to a patient, and they can nominate a friend or family member to receive a matching teddy/teddies. This is ideal for children/grandchildren, to let them know they are thinking of them. The teddy will then be packaged and sent to the patient’s loved one with their personalised message.

Sharing messages

Messages can be relayed between patients and your loved ones. For those at home, a message template to be shared can be downloaded at the bottom of this page and emailed to our team. If patients want to relay messages to their loved ones, we can help support them with this.

If you would like to add a scanned photograph or maybe a younger relative’s drawing to send to your loved one, please add as an attachment to the email and we will be happy to laminate them and deliver them to your relative. We please ask you to limit this to a maximum of two attachments.

Personal property

Due to visiting restrictions, family and carers will not be allowed to enter the hospital. However, they can contact the ward and arrange a time to drop off certain personal possessions for patients.

For infection control purposes, during the COVID-19 escalation period, the only personal property that will be received in to the organisation are:

• Mobile phones
• Mobile phone chargers
• Tablet devices
• E-readers (e.g. Kindle)
• Nightwear
• Underwear
• Clothing for discharge.

Exceptions to this list will be made for items such as glasses, dentures, hearing aids and walking aids. Other items such as food and toiletries must not be brought in for patients.

If you wish to send a message to a member of staff to thank them for their efforts in caring for you or your loved one during the COVID-19 pandemic, again you can email or relay your words directly to the team, or use and email the staff thank you template below.