Integration of incident and risk management raises the bar with nearly 300% increase in risk reporting in just three years

Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust (LCFT), provider of health and wellbeing services for a population of around 1.4 million people, uses Datix software to drive consistently excellent standards of care and patient safety across the organisation. Since implementing Datix, LCFT has successfully recorded an average of 25,000 incidents a year and almost tripled the number of risks reported since 2012. At the same time, it has created a highly flexible framework that aids regulatory compliance and inspires confidence in commissioners who have commended the trust for its effective management of serious incidents.

LCFT has expanded the original Datix system to encompass Incidents, Claims, Risk Register, Customer Care, Safety Alerts as well as Dashboards and Hotspots modules. Datix was initially selected for its flexibility and high levels of configurability.

Matthew Joyes, Associate Director of Safety and Quality Governance at LCFT said, “Datix is a key safety and quality solution that is highly flexible, allowing us to use it for much more than reporting data. It has become a highly valuable, strategic tool that enables us to ensure our healthcare environment is run efficiently in a very visible way, essential in today’s demanding regulatory and ever-changing NHS landscape.”

Three additional healthcare organisations merged with Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust in 2011. LCFT set up the Quality SEEL framework (Safety, Effectiveness, Experience & Leadership), a quality improvement and assurance framework designed to track the performance of its four new clinical networks against the Care Quality Commission (CQC) standards. The Safety and Quality Governance Department then trained staff to ensure any gaps were recorded on the Datix Risk Register. The new programme and associated training has been so successful that the number of risks recorded has risen dramatically from 685 in 2012 to 1,699 to date in 2015, nearly a three-fold increase in as many years.

The Datix system has achieved widespread adoption across the Trust because staff recognise the benefits of using it.

Eileen Stokes, Risk Manager at Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust, explained, “Staff have embraced the Datix Dashboards module for its easy-to-use functionality, versatility and graphical displays. It is has helped to transform our approach to incident management and dramatically fostered an environment of greater collaboration across the organisation and with commissioners.”

Staff also use the Datix Hotspots module and have the ability to highlight potential problem areas, such as self-harming, where a ‘hotspot’ limit is set so that the issue is escalated to management should a certain number of self-harming incidents occur. This provides the evidence necessary to make meaningful changes.

Jonathan Hazan, Director at Datix concluded, “Changes in healthcare guidelines, policies and regulation are all designed to make a better health service for the population. However, they can put constant pressure on healthcare organisations to deliver excellent patient care safely and on budget. Datix is a proven patient safety and risk management solution with a long track record of helping healthcare managers make fast and effective decisions based on data and shared learning to help keep patients safe from harm.”
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About Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust
Lancashire Care NHS Foundation Trust (LCFT) provides health and wellbeing services for a population of around 1.4million people. The Trust offers a broad range of services from health visiting, podiatry, sexual health and dentistry as well as inpatient and community mental health services. The trust covers the whole of the county and employs around 7,000 members of staff across more than 400 sites.
LCFT services are within easy reach of the Lake District, Forest of Bowland, Blackpool, Southport and the Yorkshire Moors, as well as the historic cities of Lancaster, Manchester, Preston, Liverpool and the market towns of Garstang, Chorley and Bury.
For more information, please visit www.lancashirecare.nhs.uk
About Datix

Datix has been a pioneer in the field of patient safety since 1986 and is today a leading supplier of software for patient safety, risk management, incident and adverse event reporting. Datix aims to help healthcare organisations build a culture and practice that drives excellence in patient safety. It recruits and retains people committed to the healthcare sector and continually invests in its software and services to ensure that it integrates best practice and learning.

Datix is focused on the health and social care sector. Its customers include public and private hospitals, primary care providers, GP surgeries, mental health and ambulance service providers. Its clients also include organisations delivering care home and domiciliary care services. Within the UK this includes more than 75% of the National Health Service. Internationally the Datix client base is growing rapidly and includes large scale deployments in Canada and the USA as well as clients in Europe, Australia and the Middle East.

Datix is headquartered in London, United Kingdom. To learn more, visit www.datix.co.uk or call +44 (0)20 8971 1971
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