A team effort to ensure gold standard care for patients with hip fractures has resulted in a national award for Walsall Healthcare NHS Trust which is now rated as second best in the region for its service.
Reduced hospital stays, less time in theatre for patients, a decrease in mortality rates and improvements in the timeliness of pain relief have all been achieved as a result of the Quality Improvement work carried out by the Neck of Femur team at Walsall Manor Hospital.
The team has today (Wednesday 15 June) been announced as the winning entry in the Influencing Change category of the Clinical Audit Heroes awards, which are a key part of Clinical Audit Awareness Week.
Clinical Audit Awareness Week (13-17 June 2022), hosted by the Healthcare Quality Improvement Partnership (HQIP) in collaboration with the National Quality Improvement (incl. Clinical Audit) Network (N-QI-CAN), celebrates the benefits and impact of clinical audit and quality improvement work in healthcare organisations including hospitals, GP practices and hospices.
The Walsall award submission highlighted how audit data collected for the National Hip Fracture Database led to the development of a new fracture femur pathway, which was used to standardise care and embed a consistent approach to the initial management of patients.
The judges were impressed by the team’s use of a national audit project to produce impressive results and described its work as an “excellent example of using a range of approaches to achieve sustainable results, especially the quick wins.”
Mr Thomas Moores, Consultant Orthopaedic Surgeon and Trauma Lead, said: “This is an award that goes to the whole team involved – Advanced Clinical Practitioner Louise Pickering, colleagues across Wards 9 and 10, Physiotherapists, Occupational Therapists, Orthopaedic Consultants, the Orthogeriatric team, the Trauma Theatre team, anaesthetists and Emergency Department staff.
“We were very honest when it came to looking at Walsall’s weaknesses and set about learning from others to drive up standards for our patients. We went to Rotherham, a Trust with a similar demographic, to find out about the work it was doing and how we could use colleagues’ learning there.
“We are incredibly proud to be ranked second in the region for our service now which is thanks to the improvements we as a team have made. These include us now giving every patient coming through ED with a fractured hip a Fascia Iliac Block (form of pain relief), increasing the rate from 20% to 80%.
“We are delighted to be recognised in the Clinical Audit Heroes awards. By making reliable data available, clinical audits help to improve the care our patients receive. They provide the evidence to show when we’re getting it right and help us to identify areas where we need to focus our improvement efforts.”
Jane Ingham, Chief Executive of Healthcare Quality Improvement Partnership, said: “Without clinical audit, there would be no intelligence on which to evidence the success of NHS services and track the differences that improvement activities make.”