Speak up: annual report 2016/17 – Healthwatch
The Healthwatch network heard from 341,000 people, carers and staff during the last year about what they think of health and social care service. This annual report to Parliament highlights a summary of the common theme in people’s good and bad experiences and what could be improved.

Quarterly monitoring report 24: November 2017 – The King’s Fund 
As the Chancellor prepares to announce the Budget later this month, these findings show that a seven-year squeeze on NHS and social care budgets is taking a significant toll on patient care. Analysis for the report suggests that the NHS is heading into winter on a knife edge with performance worse than at this time last year against a number of key indicators.

The NMC register: 30 September 2017 – Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC)
This report presents data from the NMC register and finds that an increasing number of nurses and midwives are leaving the profession rather than joining it. It also finds that the number of nurses and midwives from Europe has decreased, with a 67 per cent rise in staff leaving and an 89 per cent drop in those requesting to join the NMC register.

Accelerated access scheme means patients will get new treatments faster – DOH
The government has announced a new fast-track route into the NHS for “breakthrough” medicines and technologies. This will speed up the time it takes for patients to benefit from ground-breaking products for conditions such as cancer, dementia and diabetes.

Help your colleagues talk performance – NHS Employers
Work in communications or human resources? Our handy PPM toolkit communications pack contains intranet and newsletter copy, tweets and a digital signature to help you share this popular toolkit with your colleagues.

Quality checking draft toolkits
NHS England has published series of NHS Quality Checking draft toolkits. NHS England has worked with people with a learning disability, autism or both and voluntary groups to develop these draft toolkits which can be used to quality check various NHS services.   NHS England is now seeking feedback on these toolkits from people who work in the services, commissioners and other interested parties.  The closing date for feedback is 1 December 2017.

Adult weight management KPIs
Public Health England has published Key Performance Indicators: Tier 2 weight management services for adults.   This document provides an example of the Key Performance Indicators which could be incorporated into a specification for a tier 2 adult weight management service. The KPIs are intended to be used in conjunction with a service commissioned and delivered in line with the Public Health England services.  

Paediatric intensive care audit
The Healthcare Quality Improvement Partnership has published Paediatric Intensive Care Audit Network: annual report 2017.  This report presents findings for the five quality metrics adopted by the Care Quality Commission (case ascertainment, mobilisation time, nurse establishment, emergency readmissions and SMR).   It highlights that paediatric intensive care units are operating under increased pressure as they cope with rising numbers of patients and a lack of specialist nurses.

Countering fraud in the NHS
A new special health authority, the NHS Counter Fraud Authority (NHSCFA), has been launched to detect, reduce and deter fraud, bribery and corruption within the NHS.

Improving access to general practice
NHS England has published Improving access to general practice: national slidepack.  This slidepack has been produced to support the roll-out of improved access to general practice and is aimed at general practice staff and commissioners.

HSJ Roundup (contact the Library for further details)

• CQC to expand number of providers it registers 
  The Care Quality Commission intends to expand the number of providers it registers.
• People with learning disabilities ‘less likely to have care errors picked up’ 
  An investigation into the deaths of people with learning disabilities has revealed they were “less likely” to have mistakes in their care “picked up”.
• Clinical director loses employment tribunal over private work 
  A former clinical director has lost his employment tribunal case after a judge ruled he quit his trust over the impact a reconfiguration would have had on his private work, not over patient safety.
• Confed: ‘Precarious’ NHS needs extra £4bn just to sustain services 
  The health service needs a minimum of £4bn additional revenue just to sustain day to day services, the NHS Confederation has warned.
• Exclusive: Mergers involving 11 CCGs get green light 
  NHS England has approved unprecedented changes to clinical commissioning groups across the country, consolidating 11 CCGs into four, HSJ can reveal.
• Private provider shuts children’s unit after regulators intervene 
  An independent provider is to stop providing children and adolescents’ mental health services at one of its units after NHS England and the Care Quality Commission said further action was needed to safeguard the “health and welfare” of patients.
• Trust cuts nurse numbers to make way for nursing associates 
  The board of a hospital trust in the West Midlands has agreed to reduce the numbers of registered nurses on its wards replacing them with nursing associates.
• Exclusive: Investigation into financial management of large acute trust 
  An investigation has been launched into the financial management of a large acute trust after external suppliers began threatening legal action over unpaid bills, HSJ has learned.
• Exclusive: Non-execs resign after citing lack of scrutiny for ‘hospital group’ board 
  Two non-executive directors resigned after raising concerns around the governance of an NHS hospital trust involved in a new ‘group model’, HSJ has learned.
• Half of trusts miss first deadline to fund procurement transparency tool 
  Around half of NHS trusts are yet to pay for a procurement analytics tool despite being told to do so in August.
• Trust chiefs given new instructions to tackle winter DTOCs 
  NHS Improvement has written to the chief executives of all trusts providing community services setting out actions they must implement to reduce delayed transfers of care over winter.
• Podcast: ‘Government will not be forgiven if Brexit damages NHS’ 
  The public will not forgive the government if leaving the EU damages the NHS, Sir Vince Cable has said.
• Finance director leaves teaching hospital trust 
  The finance director of a Shelford Group trust has resigned, HSJ has learned.
• Teaching trust to exit special measures after four years 
  An NHS hospital trust in special measures for the last four years – longer than any other provider – has finally made sufficient improvement to be lifted out of the regime.

Our Fabulous NHS – Academy of Fabulous Stuff
***Get involved*** –  share your fab stuff!

• Improving communication and care planning through co-production – High Output Stoma ‘As the service team lead I noticed a clinical need for a care plan to help assist and manage patients with a high out put stomas or bowel fistulas. In the community these patients are frequently readmitted to hospital with little education to the patient of what warning signs to look out for. I attended […]
• Improving Handover from Emergency Admissions Unit (EAU) to Ward – Quality Improvement Project at Yeovil Hospital Patients would leave the Emergency Admissions Unit (EAU) for a medical ward and have a verbal nursing handover on transfer; however the handover to ward doctors is solely what they glean from the medical notes, which can vary in quality. Doctors reported difficulty in finding diagnoses and management plans. We aim to improve communication between […]
• Clinical and Non-Clinical posts supporting patient flow in AMU Our Acute Medical Unit (AMU) at Epsom and St Helier have ensured a coordinated approach to ensuring patients receive the right care, in the right place, at the right time. By recruiting a band 5 non-clinical co-ordinator and a band 7 clinical nurse navigator, patient flow is maintained through the unit, supporting the rest of […]