With summer here the focus remains on managing activity and a range of internal initiatives to improve various aspects of our care
Publishing our data is important
We are steadily publishing more and more information about our services. Here are two examples that go some way towards a more transparent way of operating
The views of our patients reflect the care we provide, and we know that good practice is influenced by patient and carer feedback about their experience. We run a feedback scheme in our hospitals, which is in place across the NHS, called the Friends and Family Test. Just before leaving our hospitals, we ask patients a few simple questions about the care we provided
Our scores are now published on our website every month, so do take a look here and see how we are doing. These can be published for each ward area, so more analysis of these in future blogs!
Like all hospitals we also publish our staffing numbers now, shift by shift for every clinical area – they are updated regularly and are here
Salmonella update
We’ve not had any further cases in the hospital or in the community since 19 June, but we are still strongly advising relatives and visitors not to bring in food for patients. Public Health England are still investigating the cause of the outbreak – it appears to have originated in the community though the source is still not known
We will shortly conduct the Root Cause Analysis to understand how we managed the outbreak and to learn any lessons. I’ll keep you updated as we progress with the investigation
Performance
In recent months we’ve seen an increased level of activity in our hospitals, across many areas including planned surgery, suspected cancer, and emergency attendances and admissions. This makes it crucial that we manage the discharge process and length of stay effectively, otherwise we will quickly run short of capacity
The graph below shows our emergency discharges (activity) across the trust from adult acute wards, excluding our acute assessment areas. The overlay shows the average length of stay over the same period, demonstrating a sustained reduction of nearly 2 days
We continue to work on this using initiatives such as ‘Perfect Week’ which allow us to target specific areas of concern, and ensuring the highly effective SAFER care bundle is maintained rigorously in all ward areas
Next we need to both understand why this rise in attendances is occurring, and also look at how we make care options other than hospital admission available at the ‘front door’
#hellomynameis
Our nursing team at Good Hope have been championing the #hellomynameis campaign. The campaign, started by Dr Kate Granger after being a hospital inpatient herself, reminds clinical staff of the importance of introducing themselves to their patients when they first meet them
The campaign is going strong here and our head nurse Ann-Marie Riley has designed a pin badge that is available free of charge to all our staff. They are also available for other healthcare trusts and organisations who wish to get involved and show their support.
Here’s my badge!
To find out more about getting a badge or placing orders for your organisation, email
NHS 66
On Saturday 5 July, the NHS celebrated its 66th birthday. Dr Steve Smith, one of our Consultants developed a #NHS66 campaign to encourage celebrations across the country which really took off!
A social media campaign driven by twitter not only attracted 24,000 followers, but saw hundreds of people across the country throw parties and join in the national celebrations. #NHS66, driven by attracted 20,000 tweets on the day itself seeing the hashtag trend at sixth in the UK
You can visit the Big Up the NHS campaign here or follow on twitter
Requests were also put out for people to submit poems of 100 words or less about the best of the NHS, now available in this e-book. What a great idea and well done to Steve for an amazing effort!
Citizen Assembly
We are always looking at new ways to get people from our local communities more involved with the work we do in our hospitals. Over the last few months, we have been developing exciting plans for a Citizen Assembly. We start recruiting for the group soon and will be looking for around 30 people to join us
As our three hospitals cover such a wide area, we will be looking for representation from a wide range of locations, from South Staffs and Sutton Coldfield in the north through Small Heath and out to Shirley and Solihull in the south
The aim of the Assembly is to come together to be an independent critical friend to us, and to work in partnership with the professionals working in our organisation. To ensure a strong and influential voice, we will provide training and development for all members
The group will contribute to, and sense check, our ideas, plans and projects at strategic level, as well as being the community voice in planning, shaping and delivering our services
Our patient engagement team are leading the work on this so if you want to find out more or get involved, do give them a call on
Enjoy reading blogs about health and healthcare? Then do visit our – it is updated every week!
John
Is there not a risk that the Assembly will find it difficult to establish a role sufficiently distinct from your Governors and Members?
I’d be interested to understand how they will be differentiated
Always good to read your thoughts, mind you!