We are really pleased you want to take the time to share your story.
If you want to get an idea of the storytelling process before starting, feel free to watch this video or read about each step as you scroll down the page.
Story title and content
The first box you'll be asked to fill out asks 'What was your story about'. This one becomes the title of your story.
The second box asks 'What happened. How did you feel?' This is where the write out your story.
You can type it directly into the box, use 'voice to text' (when using a mobile device) or copy and paste it from another document.
Sharing your story means sharing your personal experience with a health, aged or community service provide written as a narrative, briefly explaining
- what happened
- what you felt it was good and why
- whether you felt there is room for improvement and why
It might be that you have received fantastic care and want to thank the staff who cared for you. If you include their first names, we call them Care Opinion heroes! If you only know their surname, we'll do our best to find out their first name so we can include that on our site.
At other times, it might be that you are not happy about what happened during your experience. Sometimes, it's a bit of both and that's fine too!
It is also helpful for staff to have an idea of if you are looking for any sort of outcome from sharing your story.
Using pictures to tell a story
You can use picture tiles to help you to tell your story as well - either completely on their own or using words as well. When you are telling your story using pictures, simply choose the picture that best represents what you want to say, and then drag it up into the white storytelling box and put it to:
- the left (to say it was good)
- to the right (to say it could be improved)
- leave it in the middle if you feel it was neutral (neither either good or bad or there were times when it was good and times when it could be improved) .
When did your story happen
We just ask for a general timeframe for when your experience occurred. This information is not shared with your service provider.
About you (relationship to the experience, age and location)
You will be asked who you are in reference to the story.
For a person who has had a healthcare experience, they might identify as the patient. For a person using a community service, they might identify as a service user.
Loved ones and carers can also share stories on behalf of the person they look after. The might identify as a parent/guardian, a relative or a carer.
Just choose the option that best suits your relationship to experience/person who had the experience. This information is made public.
We ask for your age so we can identify if anybody under the age of 18 years is sharing a story as they may be a little more vulnerable and we take extra care with their story.This information is never shared with the service provider or anybody outside of the Care Opinion Moderation Team.
We ask where you live (suburb/postcode only) so the platform can make appropriate suggestions for the service provider your experience may be about. We also use it to double check that a service provider situated a long way from you is the correct one.
This information is never shared with the service provider or anybody outside of the Care Opinion Moderation Team.
Choosing the service your story is about
The Care Opinion platform will make suggestions of service providers it thinks your story may be about. This is drawn from your location and story content.
If the provider of your care isn't listed, just type in the name of the service provider. In this context, the provider is the health service, aged care service or community care service rather than any individual clinicians.
Even if the service provider isn't listed as an option to select from, just click the little green plus button once you have typed the service name in and we'll take care of the rest from our end.
Adding tags to your story
If you want, you can add tags to your story as well to help express your thoughts and feelings. These tags are there for service providers to understand if there are things that people regularly experience so they they can identify any problem areas - or things they are doing very well.
Tags appear in your 'story summary' which appears to the left of your published story. They are very helpful as very small snapshots of an experience such as 'helpful staff' or 'timely care'. They aren't there to replace story content so it's best to keep them limited to 1-2 words.
You can also use tags to say what your story is generally about (e.g. a visit to the emergency, a surgery, a broken bone, aged care, treatment for addition). These ones appear at the bottom of your story.
Choosing an author name (username)
Everyone who shares a story on the platform remains anonymous so you will need to choose a username (author name).
That's how you will be addressed in email correspondence and responses to your story. You can use our screen name generator or choose one of your own.
If choosing your own, keep in mind that it's important avoid choosing anything that could reveal your identity to please avoid using any part of your name (your name, nickname, email address, reference to your gender or year of birth).
We also cannot have author names that mimic real-life names.
If we see a screen name that contains any of these elements, we are required to generate a random author name for them. While we respect your choice to choose this author name, our highest priority must always be to protect the anonymity of all of our storytellers.
Email address and password
This information is used purely so we can contact you about your story.
That includes sending you a link to your published story and notifying you if the service provider posts a response to you.
We also use it to contact you if we have any questions about your story that we need to clarify prior to being able to publish it. Creating a password means you can log in to see your story and post your own response to the service provider (if they respond to your story).
We are a not-for-profit organisation that does not do any direct marketing to our storytellers. Your email address is never shared with the service provider or anybody outside of the Care Opinion Moderation Team.
Optional extra steps at the end
Once you have submitted your story, there are a few additional steps you can take if you wish.
The first is to rate the service your story is about.
The questions can be slightly different depending on whether your service provider operate in the health, aged care or community care sector.
Pictured to the left is an example of the rating questions you might be asked.
The second is whether you want to provide additional information about yourself.Your demographics are completely de-identified from your story and is used for services wishing to get a greater understanding of who in their community might be sharing stories.
