Planning Your Discharge Together

It is important that, together, we plan your discharge. Together involves you, the care team and any family, carers or friends you wish to be included. Soon after you arrive in hospital, we will discuss and begin planning your discharge.  This helps to avoid any potential discharge delays and to address any concerns.

We have a dedicated discharge leaflet which offers information and support for discharge planning. A shorter version of the discharge leaflet is also available to read.

Included in the leaflet is a handy Discharge checklist. The checklist is a list of really important questions regarding your discharge. Please consider your answers, and if possible, make notes. If you or your carer, family or friends have any concerns or are aware of any circumstances that will impact your discharge arrangements, please let a member of the care team know as soon as possible. In particular, it is useful to consider the essentials you will need such as a key, food, drink, heating and other essentials, and how you will travel home.

You can also listen to the information by pressing the play button below.

Behind your bed is a Personal Information board. This board can be completed by anyone, including yourself, carers, family or friends to share important personalised information about you with our care teams. This helps to get to know you better and facilitates person-centred care.

Hospitals are the right place to be when you are ill and require help from the acute care teams, however, spending more time in hospital than you need to can do more harm than good.

Staying in hospital increases the risk of developing infections and losing strength and independence (becoming deconditioned). 

Throughout your hospital stay, there may be occasions where you will be transferred between wards. For example, you may move from the Accident and Emergency Department to an assessment ward, then to a speciality ward following your clinical diagnosis. As your condition improves or if you require support on discharge, you may move to a less acute ward.

Our main priority is to support you in a safe recovery so that you can return home as soon as you are medically well enough to leave hospital. This may not mean a full physical recovery as we can continue to support you in the community if required.

If you require additional support or it is not safe to return home, a team of health and social care professionals will support you. A discharge co-ordinator, therapist and member of the social care team may be involved. Initial conversations or assessments will take place in hospital, though some assessments may be completed outside of the hospital setting. We have a range of community services available to enable this assessment to take place at home. If we can’t assess you at home, your assessment may take place in one of our temporary bed-based settings across Calderdale or Kirklees.

• Calderdale Royal Hospital: Telephone: 01422 261399
• Huddersfield Royal Infirmary: Telephone: 01484 342000
• Calderdale Equipment - Loan Stores: Telephone: 01422 357171
• Kirklees Equipment - Medequip: Telephone: 01484 728970
• Medication Helpline: Telephone: 01422 224356
• Calderdale District Nursing Single Point of Access: Telephone: 01422 652291
• Kirklees District Nursing Single Point of Access: Telephone: 0300 304 5555

Social Services / Health and Social Care Needs

• Calderdale Gateway to Care: Telephone: 01422 393000
• Calderdale Out of Hours Emergency: Telephone: 01422 288000
• Kirklees Community Health and Social Care Hub: Telephone: 0300 304 5555
• Kirklees Out of Hours Emergency: Telephone: 01484 414933
• Kirklees Care Services Directory 2026

Age UK, Calderdale and Kirklees:

• Telephone: 01422 252040
• Telephone: 01484 535994

Carers Count

• Telephone: 0300 012 0231, 01422 39 101
• info@carerscount.org.uk

Support with Lasting Power of Attorney:

• Where to start - Lasting power of attorney - Your Voice, Your Decision – Gov.UK campaign
• Age Uk (as above)

We hope you are happy with the care provided and have a safe and pleasant discharge. If you have any concerns, complaints, compliments, or feedback please raise them with the Ward Nurse in Charge/ Co-Ordinator, or see our Patient Advice and Liaison Services (PALs) page.

Friends and Family Test (FFT)

Good care or poor care? Let us know. Please help us improve the quality of our service by telling us about the care you received.

To leave your anonymous feedback you can:

• Visit our dedicated Friends and Family Test page and select the Inpatient / Daycase option
• Complete a FFT card (please ask a member of staff for a card)
• Respond if you receive a text message from us (text message is free)

Patient Satisfaction Surveys

A member of staff may be in touch once you are discharged to talk about your experience or ask you to complete a questionnaire. If you do not wish to participate, we understand and will respect your decision.