AT A GLANCE
THE CHALLENGE
Adult community mental health services in South Staffordshire were managing high caseloads and struggling to provide a responsive service, resulting in patients facing longer waiting times than usual for treatment.
The service, which provides assessment and treatment to patients with a range of mental health needs requiring secondary care, came under review as the trust was reorganising the service in line with the Community Mental Health Framework for Adults and Older Adults and the NHS Long Term Plan’s vision for a place-based model of care.
WHAT THEY DID
Eleven clinical engagement sessions were held and an in-depth analysis carried out of clinical and workforce data dashboards. Of the two main patient pathways, the community intervention pathway (CIP) received ten times more referrals each year between 2019-2021 compared to the psychosis pathway. The key findings showed an increase in acuity and complexity of patients with clinicians spending more time on unplanned activities and responding to urgent situations. This was leading to planned care cancellations and patients spending longer with the service.
CLEAR RECOMMENDATIONS
Two recommendations focused on changing the skill mix and developing two new roles – responder and intervention – within the existing team while streaming patients into planned or crisis care.
These were designed to relieve pressure on the four neighbourhood teams that had recently been launched and reduce the time lost responding to emergencies. The proposed new responder roles would be dedicated to delivering urgent, unplanned care, enabling clinical staff to deliver consistent planned care to patients. The intervention roles would provide planned structured and timely care to patients to improve outcomes, increasing continuity and enhancing patient experience.
The third recommendation proposed a review of data collection on the RIO electronic patient records system to ensure accurate and consistent data was gathered to improve monitoring and support future service developments.
FORECAST IMPACT
The new roles are projected to lead to a 22% increase in workforce capacity across the four neighbourhood community teams, the equivalent of around seven WTEs, as well as give staff the choice of how they deploy their skills, improving job satisfaction and retention.
This includes a forecast reduction in time lost to unplanned activities each week of around 218 hours, with lower sickness rates and fewer vacancies.
Patient benefits include faster access to planned and unplanned mental health services with reduced waiting times, a decline in rescheduling of appointments and less likelihood of their needs being unsupported and escalating to a crisis.
For further information, visit clearprogramme.org.uk or contact the 33n team at info@33n.co.uk.
