Getting better: health information provision in Guernsey

Describes briefly the results of research carried out to look at the provision of health information for consumers on the Channel Island of Guernsey. The research utilized a three‐pronged survey to examine the views of the general public, recent hospital in‐patients and health professionals. These groups were asked to provide their views on the information currently available to them, the sources used and their degree of satisfaction with what was currently available. Respondents were also asked what could be done to improve health information provision on the island. Parallel to this, an independent audit of information sources on the island was carried out. Results establish a baseline on which plans for developing an island‐wide policy can be built. They show that there is a dearth of good information available. Consumers ask for more to be provided by health professionals and provide a number of ideas which can be used by policy makers to develop services. Concludes that current opinion would seem to be that policy makers are using the results to take some encouraging action.