Lack of capacity in our hospitals, fuelled by delayed hospital discharge is a common theme in todays over stretched NHS.
Hampshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (HHFT) developed an initiative to transform their end-of-life (EOL) care, allowing patients to return quickly to the comfort of their own home. On occasions where care packages were required, due to lack of domiciliary care, they could take up to 14 days to be put in place.
HHFT worked with Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCG) to adopt a completely new business model, utilising knowledge and resources that existed within the Trust, to establish a Homecare Team to manage the care needs of EOL patients.
The HHFT Homecare Team provides Carers to look after Patients in their own homes, allowing EOL care in accordance with Patients’ wishes. This also improves patient flow through the hospital, reducing delays in coming into hospital through the Emergency Department.
Using the existing NHS Continuing Health Care Fast Track discharge criteria for EOL patients, HHFT have been able to get a homecare service in place within 24 hours, significantly reducing the time patients spend in a hospital bed.
Ensuring maximum time with patients and minimum time on back-office tasks and travel were essential to providing a high quality service. HHFT needed a solution that could schedule visits, manage staff availability, minimise travel between visits, and ensure staff were effectively utilised.
HHFT looked at available technology and chose CM’s CallConfirmLive! Scheduling to efficiently roster visits, giving them flexibility to make changes in real-time as circumstances required. HHFT’s colleagues in Hampshire County Council have used CallConfirmLive! across older adults and supported living Clients for many years. With the wider integration agenda in mind, it made logical sense to use the same tried-and-tested solution.
CM staff impressed the HHFT team with their system demonstration and willingness to commit to incredibly short implementation timescales.
Staff in the community quickly and easily record care visits using their mobile devices. CM’s Mobile Workforce Solution also gives them real-time access to their roster so they can keep up to date with any changes. This reduces the need to phone or visit the hospital – ensuring staff spend maximum time out visiting patients.
Care Workers have also welcomed the reassurance that CallConfirmLive! brings, as their whereabouts are known when making community visits alone.
The CCG needed transparency on service performance and costs to facilitate payment. This information is easy to report on from CallConfirmLive! and gives the CCG all the data they need to evidence service delivery, understand the number of Patients, hours of care delivered etc.
HHFT have found the reporting functionality invaluable, enabling them to monitor the cost per hour of care and ensuring that patients get a review after 12 weeks.
The HHFT Homecare Team is a shining example of finding new ways of working to get patients closer to home, utilising technology that ensures quality and efficiency. HHFT have improved services to our patients, reduced bed days and freed up capacity.
Dan Parr, Cancer Services Projects & Business Lead said: “In light of having short deadlines and adopting a completely new business model at HHFT, it was a massive achievement getting the service up and running. We couldn’t have done it without the support of the CM team. CallConfirmLive! allows us to ensure the right people are in the right place at the right time. We have a wealth of management information at the touch of a button. Improving choice for Patients at EOL justifies the hard work from all the parties in getting this set up.”
Nita Hughes, Interim General Manager at West Hampshire CCG, identified that CCGs are increasingly specifying Electronic Care Monitoring system requirements within NHS contracts for independent sector care contracts. From a CCG’s perspective, the ability to ensure care is delivered in line with the commissioned care plan is a key component of quality and financial assurance monitoring.
The development of the HHFT end-of-life service in Hampshire has had a positive impact on service delivery of NHS Continuing Healthcare Fast Track services for those eligible for this Patient pathway.
Mark Kennion, Commercial Director, CM added: “Our heritage in supporting community-based care made us an ideal partner for HHFT to deliver their end of life service. The timely delivery of services, and staff who have the very latest patient information, are critical to delivering quality end of life care. We’re delighted that our technology has supported HHFT in improving patient experience whilst realising efficiencies.”
