IT'S good to talk just ask staff at Swindon's Princess Margaret Hospital.

Managers there believe good advice should be shared.

So every year they get their workers together and have a brainstorm about how to make the job easier.

Scores of nurses, doctors and non-medical support staff attended a recent Innovations Day at PMH.

People with suggestions presented them in a series of seminars while others listened, took notes and went away with fresh ideas that should hopefully improve patient care in the future.

Senior nurse manager Julie Gore explained: "This is the third time we have held this and we hope to make it an annual event.

"The idea behind it is to allow groups within the Trust to tell their colleagues about the good work they are doing, share good practice and give them an insight into the work being carried out in other departments.

"When I started working here, I discovered that there were many examples of excellent work being carried out, but not many people got to hear about them.

"It is also good for morale to share our successes.

"All members of the Trust were invited, along with representatives from Primary Care Groups, and other organisations we work alongside, such as the University of the West of England and Oxford Brookes University."

In introducing the series of lectures, Nicholas Godden, chairman of Swindon and Marlborough NHS Trust, that like the human body, which renews itself every seven years, the Trust has to examine its own practices and constantly adapt to changing circumstances.

As well as the series of lectures from groups such as the newly established Patient Advocacy and Liaison Service, other hospital workers created a series of displays to promote the work of their departments in the hospital.