Hello, my name is Arif Patel, I’m Associate Director of Integrated Care and Partnerships at East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust and I have the pleasure of being guest blogger this week.
Last week's blog focused on the work taking place to help patients return home as soon as they are well enough. This week I’d like to share with you how we are working with our patients to give them more control over their appointments so they are more convenient and meet their individual needs.
Every year we carry out over 500,000 outpatient appointments as we help our patients manage their conditions and ongoing treatments.
Traditionally, patients would have been referred to the hospital to see a specialist face-to-face. The doctor would then create follow-up appointments to provide ongoing care and check-ups. If their symptoms are under control, they are making good progress or their circumstances haven't changed, further appointments might not be necessary.
Now, improvements in technology, changes to lifestyle and the development of treatment pathways have opened the door to a much more flexible approach, personalised to each patient's needs and preferences. As a result, we are collectively transforming the way we do things, with patients at the centre of how we reshape services, giving them greater control over how, when and where their care is managed.
Through Patient Initiated Follow-Ups, or PIFU for short, patients can book an appointment as and when they need to see somebody - for example: if they have experienced increased pain or problems with medication. It means better access to follow-up care when the patient needs it; patients avoid unnecessary appointments, saving them time, money and unnecessary worry; and clinicians have more time to see the patients who need them the most.
This certainly sounds like a win-win situation, and it is! We already have several teams who use PIFU – and that list is growing all the time.
That's not the only positive change being made, as we are also continuing to build on our successful virtual consultations, giving patients the option of a video or telephone appointment as an alternative to having to physical attend the hospital.
Attending a hospital appointment is not always easy for our patients due to cost of transport, caring responsibilities and fitting appointments around work. And yet for many, it would be just as effective (and more practical) to have the appointment from the comfort of their own home.
Our telephone and video consultations make it easier and more convenient for patients and their clinicians to attend important appointments.
They are now delivered across many of our services, including gynaecology, diabetes, cancer services and endocrinology, with more and more services joining the list each month. In July nearly 8,500 remote consultations took place and we are looking to increase that significantly over the next 12 months.
It’s not just face to face appointments benefiting from the switch to virtual appointments, but also group sessions. A fantastic example is the Neuro Rehabilitation OnLine (NROL) programme that helps brain injury and stroke survivors. It is run jointly by the Trust and the University of Central Lancashire, with support from the SameYou charity, and uses online video sessions to provide one-to-one and group specialist neurorehabilitation.
It supports patients in their homes to ensure they can continue their recovery, with physical, talking and community sessions delivered by NHS therapists.
It's a great example of how we are developing a hospital without walls, with care being provided in a place and at a time convenient to our patients rather than within the traditional confines of a hospital building.
It’s only been made possible thanks to the amazing ‘can do’ attitude of our teams who are leading and supporting this work – it’s the same safe, personal and effective care, just delivered in a different way and already we are seeing positive results.
Over the coming months, we will be stepping up our work to increase take up of our PIFU and remote appointments as we build on the momentum achieved so far.
By working together and continuing to redesign our services, we can create long-lasting improvements for all our patients.