Language of Patient Feedback

Paul Baker is Professor of English Language at the Department of Linguistics and English Language, Lancaster University, where he is also a member of the ESRC Centre for Corpus Approaches to Social Science (CASS). He has written 16 books and is also commissioning editor of the journal Corpora (EUP). Gavin Brookes is Senior Research Associate in the ESRC Centre for Corpus Approaches to Social Science (CASS) in the Department of Linguistics and English Language at Lancaster University. His research interests include corpus linguistics, (critical) discourse studies, multimodality and health communication. Craig Evans is a student in the ESRC Centre for Corpus Approaches to Social Science (CASS) in the Department of Linguistics and English Language at Lancaster University, where he is currently working on his PhD studying NHS patient feedback and staff responses using a corpus-based approach to discourse analysis. His interests include discourse and identity, social care and health communication.

• List of figuresList of tablesAcknowledgements Introduction: The NHS, patient feedback and corpus linguistics What seems to be the trouble?: Identifying key areas of patient concern On a scale of 1 to 5…: Comparing the rating scale with written feedback Rude receptionists, dismissive doctors and lovely nurses: Comparing NHS providers and staff I have been a patient with this surgery all my life: Age and evaluation Real men don’t feel pain: Language and gendered expectations Your feedback is important to us: Staff replies to patient feedback Conclusion: The health of the NHSReferencesIndex

"Engaging and thought-provoking throughout, this corpus-assisted study of patient feedback combines theoretical discussions with a wealth of empirical and practical insights. It will be of great interest to linguistics and communication scholars as well as health practitioners."Nelya Koteyko, Queen Mary University of London, UK