Hello, I’m Jo Hopkins, Project and Performance Manager in the Estates and Facilities Team, and I’m delighted to be this week’s guest blogger.
Recently I have had the opportunity of working with Integrated Care System (ICS) colleagues and Trust teams to gain a better understanding of the NHS, as I led the project team for the Warp-It project. This great initiative will help teams save money and improve sustainable approaches for the supply of commodities, such as office or ward furniture.
It’s been an interesting project to work on and I’m proud to see it now come to life as it has been officially launched in all five ICS trusts, including ELHT.
Within this project three distinct problems were identified:
1. Funding - we don’t always have the funding required to purchase commodities
2. Time - we often need things quickly
3. Storage - we don’t have adequate storage space; this leads to storing things inappropriately, creating health and safety risks and damage.
The team I have been working with investigated a way of supporting the management of items no longer needed but still in good condition. We identified a piece of software called Warp-It to help us do that. Warp-It gets best value out of waste resources, by finding owners for items that would otherwise have to be disposed of. The system helps support the organisation and the wider community towards more sustainable healthcare.
Essentially, it is like eBay but without money being transferred. It is an online platform where colleagues can upload details of items that are in good quality but no longer required. It also provides colleagues the opportunity to browse the listings and claim items that they require. Using Warp-It will reduce our waste and prevent unnecessary purchases – a win-win!
NHS Healthier England thought this was such a good idea, they agreed to fund all five Trusts in our ICS for the first year.
So where are we up to?
Pilot stage – each of the five Trusts are in the process of making their system live and trading items internally. Some Trusts are fortunate to have regional logistics available to them and the ability to transfer goods.
Stage 1 – the next step is to check that each Trust is trading to all their own sites, which can be challenging due to distance between hospital locations.
Stage 2 – is all about working out the wider transportation so we can expand the scheme further to allow Trusts to work together. It is crucial that we find a cost-effective way of transporting items to and from Trusts across the geographical area of the ICS and gain the greatest efficiencies. There are some challenges still to be overcome before we can gain the full potential of the Warp-It system.
We’ve only been live with Warp-It for around a short time but we are already seeing the benefits and achieved the following savings:
These are great figures which we can improve on as membership increases.
The NHS expands and contracts in response to healthcare demands which lead to changes in teams and office spaces. Trusts are often offered equipment free of charge but are unable to accept them due to the lack of storage space available. However, by redistributing unused items via the Warp-It system across the ICS at minimal cost, teams can take full advantage of the offers of new items.
Using the full potential of the Warp-It system can help with cost reduction and sustainability, so it’s great to see all the Trusts within Lancashire and South Cumbria supporting the project.
Finally, I would like to thank everyone who supported us to get the system live. As we move through the first quarter of the year, I’d encourage everyone to take the opportunity for a spring clean – with the help of Warp-It, of course