Tackling hospital backlogs

This is the third episode of our podcast series Providers Deliver: Tackling the care backlog.

This episode focuses on the successes of two acute and one specialist trusts in tackling care backlogs. 

This week we get an insight into the lessons learned by a specialist trust as they devised a way to monitor and treat shielding heart patients at the height of the pandemic, how another trust found a way to increase theatre capacity to treat patients with life threatening tumours, and how a third built on the volunteer model established during the vaccination drive to provide an orthopaedic 'one stop shop' assessment centre which has made a substantial impact on waiting lists.

This episode includes contributions from: 

Royal Papworth Hospital NHS Foundation Trust

Alaina Yardley, Lead Cardiac Physiologist, and Eilish Midlane, Chief Operating Officer, discuss the impact of the new approach their cardiac service is taking, via the use of remote home monitors, to follow-up with and manage the heart devices of thousands of patients who have been shielding and needed to minimise face to face appointments during the pandemic. 

King's College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust

Clive Kay, chief executive, and Ranjeev Bhangoo, head of neurosurgery, explain how the neurosurgery team is using extra theatre time and capacity to carry out 750 more operations a year for patients with time-critical brain tumours and spinal cord compression to prevent backlogs building. As a result, they have been able to operate on individuals as quickly as before the pandemic and have also increased capacity by 7%. Lastly, we hear from Jo, the sister of one of the patients treated at King’s, about her and her brother’s positive experience: she explains that they did not feel "left on hold" and were as close to the neurosurgery team as before the pandemic.

Dorset County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust

Adam Savin, associate director of performance, James Smith, orthopaedic consultant and Colin Senior, orthopaedic clinical director, at Dorset County Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, discuss the establishment of an orthopaedic outpatient assessment centre in Dorchester which has had a significant impact on the trust’s work to tackle backlogs. To date, the service is seeing 31% more patients using the same paid staffing model as before, with volunteers helping with the smooth running of the centre. This has meant that total waiting lists have reduced by 52% and the number of people waiting the longest has reduced by over 90%.

They are also seeing a reduction in people’s conditions becoming more serious and requiring surgery. The key to the centre’s success has been making it a one stop shop with multidisciplinary teams and others such as third sector providers on site.

Many thanks to all of them, and their staff.