The legislative changes of the Health & Care Act Bill, set up to enable health and care organisations to work more closely together and streamline healthcare planning and improve interoperability last year saw the abolishment of Clinical Commissioning Groups (CCGs) and the introduction of 42 Integrated Care Systems (ICS).
Changing the way that healthcare is commissioned, and part of the ICS structure sits Integrated Care Boards (ICB) that have the responsibility of developing a plan for meeting the health needs of the population, managing the NHS budget and arranging for the provision of health services.
One of those ICBs, serving 2.7 million citizens across nine local authorities*, and one of the largest integrated care organisations in the UK, is NHS Cheshire and Merseyside.
Read their story on how they are responding to the demand in services whilst delivering better patient outcomes.
The AACC staff within the CCG were using multiple systems which came with multiple challenges, mainly due to staff inputting data into property fields, which was time consuming and open to error. Not having visibility on patient flow in one central location meant important details could be easily missed and lead to delays.
A solution had to be found for the CCG to optimise service delivery and adhere to the strategic objectives they faced:
The CCG decided that the way to address this was to create a new end-to-end data management and reporting system that would align to the strategy and verify, based on national level the importance of digitalisation and information technology to mature and assure the delivery of All Age Continuing Care, as reflected in published guidance including ‘Continuing Healthcare (CHC) Maturity Framework’ and ‘All Age Care Continuing 2022 Vision’.
A system that could be accessed by both staff and patients, where referral forms could be digitised, easily accessed and submitted. This means users can be immediately updated on progress whilst accessing administrative and payment tools where needed, giving full visibility of the complex process.
Since 2017 – prior to the formation of NHS Cheshire and Merseyside, South Cheshire CCG, East Cheshire CCG, Vale Royal CCG and Wirral CCG have been customers of IEG4, a provider of digital solutions to the public sector.
IEG4’s ‘All Age Continuing (AACC) & Continuing Healthcare (CHC) Platform for the NHS‘ integrates processes into one digital system, improving workflows for staff and allowing the management of the entire assessment and referral process end-to-end whilst also managing case management for patients that are eligible for CHC. The solution also has mapped data fields to meet the required fields in the Patient Level Data Set (PLDS), which enables NHS Cheshire and Merseyside to generate an extract of the data required for the PLDS, a monthly reporting requirement set out by the NHSE, with all statutory reporting eventually done via the PLDS.
This significantly reduces administration time, improves efficiencies and provides a better joined up framework of professionals, working together to support the needs of patients looking to access services, such as information, updates and communications online, and creating a package of care that fully meets the patients’ needs.
Having an efficient, future-proof, fully digitised solution was paramount for NHS Cheshire and Merseyside in their response to the needs of people accessing the complex service.
One area that was in need of digitising was the Children and Young People’s aspect of the All Age Continuing Care process. In digitising the national Pre-Assessment Checklist the process has been significantly streamlined, providing transparency and clarity. With the increase in demand for these services, the benefits of digitisation is that everyone involved in the process has visibility of the patient journey, maximising clinical time and providing input from clinicians and the local authority to support the joint decision making process.
Other modules of the solution now live and in full use are IEG4’s Patient Portal and Provider Portal.
Patients and their advocates are able to set up access to the Patient Portal with information provided by the ICB. With access to the Patient Portal, here they can see the progress of the referral, alongside static generic information explaining the process clearly – something which given the circumstances becomes a reliable and reassuring go-to asset.
The Provider Portal manages the financial and administrative element of the agreed care package, with care providers within NHS Cheshire and Merseyside being set up within the ‘Digital CHC Directory of Services’ and having access to the portal. This allows them to see secure details of their patients and the packages of care contracted to be delivered by them.
With the ability to populate data from the care package and generate Individual Placement Agreements (IPA) and service confirmations, the care providers can see and verify that the contracted care has been delivered and then claim payment for that service delivery. This has eliminated the need for providers to create manual invoices to send onto NHS Cheshire and Merseyside and has reduced workload significantly for a number of care homes using the Provider Portal.
It’s clear from the results being achieved by NHS Cheshire and Merseyside that digitising the assessment forms and the process around All Age Continuing Care is delivering a robust and effective service.
With additional modules soon to go-live, and the demand for the service continuing to increase, the rollout and roadmap plans around the end-to-end digital solution means that NHS Cheshire and Merseyside, and its patients will continue to have a transparent process in place, giving control and confidence to everyone with a touchpoint around this complex and challenging service.
*Three places within Cheshire and Merseyside are using IEG4’s Digital CHC Solution
