Agenda item

To consider NHCFT priorities and Quality Account.

The Sub-committee received a presentation from Jeremy Rushmer, Medical Director of Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust, which set out the Annual Plan and Quality Account.

It was noted that improving quality continued to be the priority of the Trust with a focus on ‘making sure patients get the best possible outcome and experience every time they need our care’.

It was noted that due to the Covid-19 pandemic, guidance has been issued to state that External Audit assurance work on the Quality Account does not need to be undertaken for 2020/21 and no governor selected local indicator will need to be chosen for the year.

The Sub-committee noted the progress made against the priorities identified in the 2020-21 Quality Account which were:  Flow, Management of acutely unwell patients, supply and administration of medicines, children and young people’s emotional well-being and mental health, end of life care and bereavement, patient experience, and staff experience.  All targets had been achieved, with the exception of some areas of management of acutely unwell patients, where some areas have been delayed due to the impact of staff relocations due to Covid.

In relation to priorities for 2021/22, eight specific quality improvement priorities have been identified, and these are:

•           Access Standards – regaining the standards for patient access;

•           Outpatients – embedding changes in delivering outpatient appointments;

•           Deteriorating patient – to continue to improve the management of acutely unwell patients in both hospital and community settings;

•           Delirium – improvement of the detection of patients with delirium and the training of staff to improve early detection.

•           Patient Group Directives (PGD) – continue to improve how we supply and administer PGDs to patients;

•           Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services (CAMHS) – build on the work undertaken this year to improve the timely access to the full range of CAMHS services;

•           Patient Experience – intention is to get the patient experience back to pre-Covid levels;

•           Staff Experience – again to build on the successful staff experience programme with the introduction of real time staff experience reporting.

It was noted that the Quality Account will be circulated to stakeholders for formal opinion at the end of April and will be uploaded to NHS choices by the end of June.

Members asked whether the Trust had seen any increased demand for CAMHs Services as a result of the pandemic and it was noted that this had not been the case as yet.

The Chair acknowledged delivery of the key priorities despite the challenge of the past year and thanked the Trust and all staff involved in delivering services across the year.

Jeremy Rushmer also placed on record the thanks of the Trust for the support and cooperation of the public during the pandemic and also to the Local Authority who had worked in close partnership with the Trust over the last year.

Resolved:  That responsibility for finalising the sub-committee’s statement on the Quality Account be delegated to the Chair of the Sub-committee.