A PATIENT once dubbed a nuisance whinger is celebrating now an NHS trust’s complaint policy has been alt- ered – after he complained about it.

Andrew Brown, aged 49, of St John’s, Worcester, who was classed as a vexatious complainant by Worcestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust, is pleased trust bosses have listened and changed the wording of their complaints policy, removing certain parts he found unhelpful.

The original policy said people could be classified as vexatious if they told “horror stories” to all and sundry about their experience or exhibited “attention-seeking behaviour” which could in-clude invoking an MP or Secretary of State.

Mr Brown maintained that a patient should be able to seek support from an MP or Secretary of State if they had a legitimate grievance while telling their so-called horror stories may be in the public interest.

However, these controversial terms have now been dropped by the trust, al-though other aspects of the policy remain unchanged.

People who complain can still be branded vexatious if they are abusive, violent and threatening or make unreasonable demands, record conversations without consent and focus on trivial matters.

Trust bosses will acknowledge correspondence from vexatious complainants but do not have to answer their letters and phone calls. Mr Brown said he welcomed the alterations.

“I challenged these terms in a letter to Harry Turner [the trust chairman] in January 2012 but it has taken this long to achieve change. The recent supportive in-volvement of the Patients Association may have been key as well as the helpful coverage by the Worcester News,” he said.

“Last year as a result of my input they did create a right of appeal, and allowed my own appeal but the aspects potentially censuring contact with the MP/minister or telling one’s story remained in the policy until now.

“However, the policy still makes it possible for vexatious status to apply where a person refuses to accept documented evidence of treatment.

“I have misgivings about that because occasionally significant or even potentially dangerous or catastrophic errors in such records arise.”

Helen Blanchard, chief nur-sing officer, said: “Com-plaints are only termed vexatious as a last resort and after all reasonable measures have been taken to try to resolve the complaint over a sustained period of time. Wor- cestershire Acute Hospitals NHS Trust has no patients deemed as vexatious complainants.

“Mr Brown has raised some helpful points about our current policy and we have taken these on board. We are reviewing our complaints policy to reflect best practice including how we approach potential vexatious complainants in the future. “We will be involving patients and the public in the review and we welcome Mr Brown’s feedback. We take all complaints very seriously, and will always spend time listening and responding to concerns to ensure a satisfactory outcome for families and to learn or change as a result of their feedback.”