Tips for relatives
Patients in hospital are confronted with many new faces and procedures and can feel a particular need for contact with someone familiar. Relatives and trusted friends can help patients to keep an overview of all the information provided.
- You are welcome to accompany the patient to medical consultations or discussions with the nursing team, and help the patient keep track of everything that gets mentioned.
- Afterwards you can chat with the patient about any concerns he/she may have.
- Please do not visit if you have a contagious illness – the immune system is weakened when people are unwell. In this case, please telephone the patient instead.
- Please take care to wash your hands when you visit someone in the hospital.
- If you are not sure how you can best support the patient during his/her hospital stay, please ask the care team for advice.
- After an operation, patients often need more rest than usual. If the patient has several relatives who would like to visit, please arrange this amongst yourselves in such a way that the patient has plenty of time to rest.
- The medical team is not able to give information about the health of a patient to anyone else without the express permission of the patient. This means the patient must specify you by name if you are a trusted person who is entitled to receive any such medical information.