Designing a comprehensive hospital-wide patient education program

Patient education is an integral part of any hospital admission. This article describes the development of a hospital-wide program which includes the assessment of patient education needs, the role of the unit patient educators, the use of free patient education television channels, the role of the patient/family education committee, the documentation of patient education, and the orientation of health professionals to the system. Mechanisms to deal with the non-English or limited-English-speaking patients are also described.