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Choice "“ valueless without meaningful information is PiF's seventh Annual Conference, taking place this year at the Thinktank Science museum in Birmingham. This year, keynote sessions bring you up to date with national information strategy and shared decision making. Workshops include those that show you how to develop information that enables and how to produce information that aids self-management. You will hear from speakers that can bring you the latest work on the Information Standard, the development of Information Prescriptions and evaluating information. The conference concludes with a crucial review, and debate, around what constitutes good quality consumer health information. Lunchtime Show and Tell sessions this year look at social media, with three 5 minutes sessions on using Twitter, using Facebook and Blogging. Online booking is now open.

Transforming Patient Experience: the essential guide, a publication from the Patient Experience Network has been launched this week. It is suitable for anyone with designated responsibility for improving patient experience "“ either as a provider of services or as a commissioner. It contains practical guidance and covers the crucial aspects of making the case for a patient experience improvements, helping leaders and staff to improve patient experience and commissioning for a positive patient experience.

Thousands of charities in the UK are aware of social media, but aren't sure what it can do for them. Even more are engaging with their audiences on social networks, but want to know how to develop and optimise their activities. CharityComms has put together a two part Guide to Social Media for Charities. Part One is aimed at those just getting started, with Part Two written for charities who are actively using social media and want practical advice on taking their comms to the next level of success.

You can now submit entries for the BMA Patient Information Awards 2012. The Awards aim to encourage the production and dissemination of accessible, well-designed and clinically balanced patient information. The BMA accepts entries in the form of leaflets, websites and other digital and online resources. All entries will be considered for the overall BMA Patient Information Resource of the Year Award, regardless of their format but the BMA now have new special award categories developed with PiF members - information that aids decision making, self care, long term condition management and an innovation award. The deadline for entries is 29 February 2012.

Many people worry that they are at a greater than average risk of developing breast or ovarian cancer because of their family history. Macmillan Cancer Support offers an online personal education and risk assessment tool that can help - OPERA. The tool is based on the NICE guidelines for Familial Breast Cancer. It asks the user specific questions about their personal and family history of breast and ovarian cancer. It then summarises their answers, gives them a 'personal assessment', and suggests what they might want to do next. The assessment includes personalised information and support about their inherited cancer risk.

Since 2008, patients have been able to post comments on and rate hospitals using the NHS Choices website. The system's proponents suggest that it helps patients to choose the best services, but no previous study has investigated whether these online ratings are related to clinical measures of healthcare quality, such as mortality rates and incidence of hospital-acquired infections. Researchers at Imperial College London examined 10,274 ratings of all NHS acute hospital trusts in England. They found that hospitals with better patient ratings tend to have lower death rates and lower readmission rates. Hospitals rated by patients as being cleaner have lower rates of MRSA infections.

Patients continue to report improvements in aspects of care that matter most to them, and 84 per cent of patients rated their experience as excellent or very good, according to the results of the 2011 Patient Experience Outpatient Survey. The results published this week show that more patients are being treated with respect and dignity and felt they were involved in decisions about their care and treatment and in the amount of information given to them about their treatment. However, the results also show that staff need to improve the way they provide information to patients about areas such as the risks and benefits of treatment, why tests are needed and the purpose of medication and side effects.

The Chief Medical Officer's National Blood Transfusion Committee 'Patient Involvement Working Group', have developed new information for patients and the public on blood transfusions. The resources include leaflets on why blood transfusions are needed and information for parents and guardians outlining what to expect if a baby needs a blood transfusion.

An independent group of experts has been established to help develop a new strategy for improving care for children and young people. The 'Children's and Young People's outcomes strategy' will focus the health service on improving health results for children, including those needing primary, hospital and urgent care, and children with long-term conditions. It will identify health issues that matter most to children and young people, and how a modern NHS will meet their needs. The Children's and Young People's Forum, which is designed on the NHS Future Forum model, will carry out a three-month period of engagement with appropriate stakeholders before submitting its recommendations to the Government later in the year.

This systematic review evaluates the effectiveness of interventions to improve health professionals' adoption of shared decision making in routine clinical practice, as seen by patients. The authors concluded that multifaceted interventions that include educating health professionals about sharing decisions with patients and patient-mediated interventions, such as patient decision aids, appear promising for improving health professionals' adoption of shared decision making in routine clinical practice as seen by patients.