SAFER CARE PROJECT
Connectivity case study: delivering safer care
Gerry Bolger, clinical lead for nursing informatics/chief nursing information officer, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust, recently shared his insights into achieving safer care through the use of patient monitoring technology at the Welch Allyn Completing the Picture educational symposium.
The ‘Six Cs’ nursing strategy, first developed by Professor Jane Cummings, the Chief Nursing Officer for England, was recently replaced by a new vision: ‘Leading change, adding value’, which focuses on how the health service can deliver care quality in challenging times, while meeting its financial objectives. One of the ‘ten commitments’ outlined in the report looks at the role of technology and states: “We will champion the use of technology and informatics to improve practice, address unwarranted variations and enhance outcomes.” Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust was highlighted as an exemplar organisation in demonstrating how technology can successfully be used to meet this commitment, while releasing time to care and improving patient safety. Speaking at the Completing the Picture educational symposium, Gerry Bolger, clinical lead for nursing informatics, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust, provided an insight into the use of patient monitoring technology to deliver ‘safer care through real-time information’.
Background
Treating over 186,000 people as inpatients and providing over one million outpatient appointments, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust is a large, complex organisation comprising St Mary’s, Hammersmith, Charing Cross, Queen Charlotte & Chelsea and the Western Eye Hospital, as well as providing renal dialysis satellite services in North West London. The Trust has a track record of innovation and was the first Academic Health Science Centre to be appointed by the Department of Health, in 2009. In recent years, the Trust has been embarking on its ‘digital journey’ and has set out five key steps towards achieving its goals. These include: 1 The introduction of digital records, so the organisation is no longer reliant on paper and information is presented digitally in a structured format.
2 Data sharing is made possible, so that information is shared between organisations and available for authorised users to view.
3 Patient engagement is facilitated by enabling patients to have access to their own record and to contribute to the content.
4 Integrated care is supported, through the management of complex pathways, including virtual MDTs, shared care plans, messaging, tasking and requesting.
5 Population health strategies are informed through data management, complex analysis, registries and score cards, as well as facilitating predictive care management.
Electronic patient records have now been successfully rolled out across the Trust, and the Trust is now piloting its Care Information Exchange where patients are now accessing their own records, viewing the results of blood tests and their appointments through a secure dedicated portal. This is part of the vision to deliver care around the patient, and the intention is to use data in the future from patients’ own devices as well as wearable technologies. “The electronic patient record is important as without this, it not possible to achieve our other ambitions,” commented Gerry Bolger. “We want to share data, not just across our health community and with GPs; we also want information flows and part of that data sharing is concerned with connectivity.” He added: “In terms of integrated care, we want to understand ‘what is the health of the population we serve?’ By understanding your population health, you can really transform health services to meet demand.” The ultimate goal, he explained, is to achieve better outcomes and promote ‘wellness’ rather than responding reactively to ‘sickness’.
Safer Care Project
Reflecting the Trust’s commitment to championing innovations that can drive improvement in health outcomes, the Safer Care Project was initiated in October 2015, with the aim of using technology to identify patients at risk of deterioration, releasing
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WWW.CLINICALSERVICESJOURNAL.COM OCTOBER 2016
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