What do patients want, a worldwide study
 14 June, 2004

Under a new partnership with The Commonwealth Fund of New York, The Health Foundation, UK, is investigating what people in the UK, USA, Canada, Australia and New Zealand think about the healthcare they receive. Through our support, for the first time, the International Health Policy Survey is taking an in-depth look at the views of patients and the public in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, comparing them to each other and to the views of patients in the other four countries.

The survey will ask questions like: How do people feel about the healthcare they receive? What kind of relationship do they want to have with their doctor and other healthcare staff? To what extent do different people want to be involved as an active partner in their care – and how often do they feel this is on offer?

The Health Foundation believes that dramatic improvements in the health of the public will only be possible if there are significant improvements in access to information about health and healthcare. The survey, reaching 7,000 people worldwide, will provide a comprehensive picture of the state of ‘health literacy’: the extent to which people are able to access healthcare information and apply it to their own circumstances. The survey will also show the extent to which social inequalities affect patients’ abilities to make informed decisions about their health and healthcare.

The results will be published early in 2005.

The tabloids aren't the only ones getting in on the act. On Thursday, a health official rapped the group.

"This is not the solution to our teenage pregnancy problem," said Jacky Chambers, director of public health in Birmingham, England, where the Silver Ring Thing will stage its second show on Saturday.

"The majority of young people taking the pledge break it," he said. "The Silver Ring Thing's approaches might contribute to fear, shame and guilt, which encourage secrecy and make it difficult for young people to take responsibility for their behavior."

Still, media types want their seat at the show tonight, said Cathy Bellafiore, a Brooklyn, N.Y., native who lives in Surrey and helped organize the trip after seeing an hourlong BBC documentary on the group.

"None of the media attention has stopped, especially television and radio," Bellafiore said. "They all want to get into the show."

"There is just not going to be room for everyone," she said.

The Silver Ring Thing boasts that more than 20,000 young Americans have adopted its pledge to remain abstinent until marriage. Those who make the vow pay $12 for a silver ring signifying their commitment. About 30 local pledgers made the trip to England.

Ethan said his mother has received as many as 300 phone calls a day since the group arrived.

"It's mostly reporters, radio shows, that kind of thing," Ethan said. He does not see what all the fuss is about.

"It's not as if people have to go see the Silver Ring Thing," said Ethan, who has lived in Europe as long as he can remember - first in Norway and for the past decade, in Britain.

His younger brother, Ashton, 14, similarly is puzzled by the uproar. "This program could save people's lives," he said.

Ethan Jacobs attends an American-run school near London, where sex education is part of the curriculum and is taught, he said, in something of a moral vacuum.

"In sex ed, some people just spend the whole time laughing," he said. "The Silver Ring Thing sort of brings religion back into it."

Britain has the highest teen birth rate in Western Europe at 25 for every 1,000 young women. But the rates in the United States are higher -- about 43 per 1,000, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.


Rick Wills can be reached at [email protected] or (724) 779-7123