Right to Respond

As part of our commitment to providing an honest and transparent view of health and social care services, Healthwatch Birmingham encourages providers to respond to comments the public have left.

Alongside ensuring providers can have a fair say in discussions about their services, replying to reviews demonstrates evidence of responding to patient feedback for the CQC, who regularly monitor our Feedback Centre. It is also an effective way to recruit service users for any wider engagement work at your organisation.

Guidelines for provider responses:

  • Keep language appropriate and civil
  • Remain professional and treat people’s comments fairly
  • Engage with the content of the review by addressing specific points and avoid cut and pasting a standard response
  • Don’t disclose the service user’s personal details or any potentially identifying information
  • Where appropriate leave organisational contact details e.g PALS or patient engagement teams for people to get further information

Remember: your response will be seen by everyone who uses the Feedback Centre, not just the original reviewer. All responses are moderated in accordance with our moderation policy.

For full terms and conditions, including a guide to how right to reply works for service providers download this guide.

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Original feedback for

Birmingham and Midland Eye Centre (BMEC)


Rude Triage Nursing staff - No 6 C's shown

My husband has repeated cysts on his eye lid. Currently there is a sty and a cyst, 6 weeks after the last surgery to remove it. The triage nurse said this was not a matter for eye casualty before even looking at the problem. My husband is diabetic with sight threatening retinopathy and was experiencing pain from the size of the cyst pressing on his eye. He had followed all of the advice to relieve the cyst but it hadn't worked. If the nurse had looked at the eye before dismissing us, had listened to the background of sight-threatening problems, we wouldn't have felt so unhappy. The nurse told us to go to the pharmacy for some over the counter medication. However, the pharmacist told us that there was nothing she could give us which would improve it at all and that we should go back to eye casualty. Our past experience of doctors at the eye centre has been very good. There is no excuse for neglecting the basics. Compassion, competence and care.