NEWS
NICE publishes a Medtech innovation briefing on PICO The National Institute for Health and Care
Waiting times for test slashed
Waiting times for a complex diagnostic test for some neurological conditions are tumbling at Poole Hospital. Patients requiring a lumbar puncture can now be seen by a nurse, performing a role traditionally provided by a doctor, on the hospital’s medical investigations unit. A lumbar puncture is used to take a sample, or measure the pressure, of fluid in the spinal cord. It can help in the diagnosis of conditions including multiple sclerosis and pressure-related headaches.
The procedure is now offered by senior nurse, sister Joy Peeke, who has undergone months of training from doctors specialising in neurology at the hospital, led by Dr Amy Ross Russell. Waiting times for non-urgent lumbar punctures have been around two months – now patients can have the test in just two weeks. “We’re driven to improve our practice on the
unit every day,” said Joy. “Offering lumbar punctures is a further extension of the extended roles nurses perform here. It means that not only can patients be seen sooner, and their
condition diagnosed, but doctors can focus on giving the expert care that they provide.” Amy, who joined the hospital in 2017, says she was keen to introduce the service here, having seen it work well elsewhere: “I had experience of nurses performing this role at a teaching hospital. “When I joined Poole Hospital, I saw that the nursing staff on the unit were incredibly motivated and passionate about developing their practise, so we explored including lumbar punctures to the wide range of diagnostic tests already offered.
“It is rare to find this service being provided by a nurse at a district general hospital, and a great credit to Joy’s commitment to giving great patient care.”
The medical investigations unit has a history of providing cutting edge nursing care. Nurses on the unit became among the first in England, outside of hospital emergency departments, to prescribe blood and blood products as part of routine care in 2012 – another service previously only provided by doctors.
Excellence (NICE) has issued a Medtech innovation briefing (MIB) on the use of Smith & Nephew’s PICO Single Use Negative Pressure Wound Therapy (sNPWT). The MIB reports the prophylactic use of PICO as a potentially more effective alternative to standard surgical dressings in the prevention of surgical site complications (SSCs). This is the first and only MIB published by NICE on an NPWT device for preventing SSCs. The prophylactic use of the PICO system is designed to be effective in reducing SSCs, including SSIs and dehiscence (wound rupturing) of the surgical incision, in patients at elevated risk of SSCs.
The PICO dressing has a proprietary ‘Airlock’ technology that uniformly delivers NPWT across a surgical incision and the surrounding zone of injury generated naturally by the incision itself.
Events
BES Healthcare Seminar. Imperial Hotel, London, 5-6 Sep 2018
Study Day 2018 – What could possibly go wrong? Lessons learned in decontamination. Birmingham Botanical Gardens, 17 Sep 2018
British Orthopaedic Association Century Congress. ICC Birmingham 25-28 Sep 2018
Infection Prevention 2018, Scottish Events Campus, Glasgow 30 Sep-2 Oct 2018
SEPTEMBER 2018
WWW.CLINICALSERVICESJOURNAL.COM I
13
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80
