Trust shortlisted for national digital award
Date of release: 19 March 2024
A new, innovative model of working has been shortlisted for a national award for its contribution to improving patients’ experience and creating a tech-savvy workforce.
The Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust (RWT) has been shortlisted in the Digital Clinical Safety Award category at this year’s Health Service Journal Digital Awards.
The annual event celebrates the power of digital products, projects and services to transform care delivery and enhance efficiency.
With more than 300 systems in place at RWT, the Digital Clinical Safety System Model encourages collaboration and bridges the divide between IT and clinical colleagues.
Since 2022 the model has brought together expertise from different professional backgrounds, including informatics, quality improvement and education, to focus on patient safety through effective use of existing IT systems. The concept involves the proactive use of data to create virtual dashboards, from “Observations on time” to the “Malnutrition Universal Screening Tool” (MUST), to ensure staff are examining the statistics and measuring the quality of care being delivered, then using the information to improve future performance.
Yat Wah Li, Chief Clinical Information Officer, Clinical Safety Officer and Consultant Anaesthetist, said: “This model encourages clinicans to engage with our systems, giving them access to more effective methods of data capture, analysis and validation. This leads to improvements in the quality of clinical assessments and decision-making.
“For patients and their families, increasing data quality helps to drive direct and indirect improvements in their care. This includes making every contact count, from scheduled appointments to unplanned emergency care, and by facilitating the correct care pathways.”
Using this model has seen improved ability to support wards to identify patients at high risk of malnutrition, and by studying data on the length of time in which catheters are inserted, a reduced risk of patients acquiring catheter-related infections. Reports, all validated by the relevant clinical leads, are then shared across the wards to help reinforce what’s working well and areas for improvement.
Ruth Stokes, Quality Senior Sister for RWT, said: “Having not carried out data analysis in any of my previous roles, I found data reporting to be quite challenging. This new way of working helps me to clearly identify wards in need of support with certain clinical assessments. It also allows me to share strategies and learnings with my colleagues.”
Due to its success, the model is now being adopted by Walsall Healthcare NHS Trust.
Debra Hickman, Chief Nursing Officer for RWT, added: “As an organisation, this model is raising digital literacy, and ultimately bridging the digital divide with the common goal of improving patient care.
“It is also creating opportunities for new digital roles, which is really exciting and will no doubt help to make our Trust more innovative and resilient for the future.”
The awards ceremony will take place on Thursday 6 June 2024 in Manchester.
ENDS
- For further information, please email: alice.sheppard3@nhs.net
