Ultrasound Team turns around waiting times

Date of release: 16 July 2024

Patients needing ultrasound scans in Wolverhampton no longer have to wait more than six weeks after an “incredible” turnaround.

The Ultrasound team

A series of initiatives over the last year have helped transform The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust (RWT) to become one of the best NHS Trusts in the West Midlands for shortest patient waits for this test.

Some of those initiatives have now been recognised by NHS England and put forward as practices to follow nationally.

Among the 13 West Midlands NHS Trusts, RWT has gone from second from bottom in the league table in April 2023 for the percentage of patients being offered an appointment within six weeks (35 per cent), to 100 per cent of patients being offered an appointment within six weeks in April 2024.

According to the latest benchmarking data, that would put RWT at the top of the performance table.

Glen Whitehouse, Group Manager: Diagnostic Services, said: “A year ago we had thousands of patients waiting for an ultrasound, and many over 13 weeks.

“As of April, no patients are waiting longer than six weeks and that will make a huge difference to patient outcomes and experience.

“This has been achieved by the incredible Ultrasound Team, which has implemented new processes.”

Lucy Willcox, Head of Operations for Radiology, said the turnaround had been down to the “invaluable” contributions of Karen Hill, Superintendent Ultrasound, and Tash Smith, Deputy Ultrasound Superintendent, the Bookings Team, the Senior Management Team, Sonographers and their Assistants.

• Recruiting nearly 20 “exceptional” Sonographers in the last 15 months while maintaining recommended scan times
• Expanding the training programme and guaranteeing suitably planned training lists
• Supporting flexible working
• Implementing Radiology Events and Learning Meetings (REALM) meetings
• Regular staff meetings
• Created protected vetting time
• Adding Flow Co-ordinators to the team
• Improving the leadership structure
• Putting on special events, such as the Physiotherapy Lead, MSK welfare session and lunch-and-learn sessions from manufacturers.

• Partial booking
• Flexible working
• Weekly meetings to review performance
• Improved its recruitment and retention to go from significant vacancies to almost none

Partial booking involves writing to the patient and offering them the opportunity to phone in and make a mutually convenient appointment, rather than sending out a fixed date and time.

Glen added: “This has been a large contributor to the success of the department but has been a massive undertaking for the booking team, which has had to completely change its way of working.

“Often this method of booking can be very intense as we can’t predict when patients will phone, making the workload far less consistent than the traditional method of booking.

“However, our booking team has risen to the challenge and has been hugely flexible around our strategic booking methods and shifting requests of staff.

“We have gone from the most challenged department in the West Midlands to one of the best – and we are already being asked for help by other departments.”

Staffing has also increased in ultrasound, with some areas doubled.

“It’s about growing the workforce to meet the demands on the service,” said Glen. “Two or three years ago we had around 16 Sonographers, we now have 34, as well as two additional trainees.

“We have also increased our Imaging Assistant workforce proportionately as the Sonographers and Imaging Assistants work together as a team.

“We have an excellent collaborative working relationship with our neighbouring Trusts and we are now looking to see if we can support them to also improve their performance,” added Glen.

ENDS

• For further information, please call Tim Nash on 07714 741097 or email tim.nash2@nhs.net