Raising Concerns‘Our Journey So Far’

Northumbria Healthcare:

• Employ nearly 10,000 staff• Cover one of the largest areas of any health trust in England• Provide integrated health and social care• Have three general hospitals and seven community hospitals

Northumbria Healthcare:• Building the first Specialist Emergency Care Hospital in the country• Due to open in June 2015• Significant organisational change programme involving most staff• 1,000 staff to be located at new Specialist Emergency Care Hospital• Configuration taking place to base sites in line with developing new

models of care

Number of staff believing high quality patient care isthe No1 priority of the trust.

“You cannot make things happen, but you can create a space in which what you want is more likely to happen.”

– Chinese proverb

Our story of moving the dot

Strong staff engagement as our foundationOur Staff Survey Performance• Best response several years in a row

– 2014 – 82%– 2013 - 78% – 2012 – 72%

• Engagement scores improved year on year⁻ 2014 – 3.92⁻ 2013 - 3.88⁻ 2012 - 3.79 ⁻ Acute Average is 3.72

Medical Engagement at the heart of our organisation

Understanding our Culture:• System wide approach• Ensuring we are values driven• Engagement in partnership with Staff, Staff Side, Governors (staff

and public) and our wider partners including on key strategic projects such as the new Northumbria Specialist Emergency Care Hospital

• Patient and staff experience is a key priority for the Trust and is well communicated as an expectation

• Strong communications from the Executive Team• Chief Executive led • Focus on “proud to be”• Responsive, transparent and action focussed• Correlating our data regularly (friends and family test,

medical engagement survey, culture survey etc)

Our values

1. Patients first2. Safe and high quality care3. Responsibility and accountability4. Everyone’s contribution counts5. Respect

Values in action:Value Based Recruitment : “The nurses are wonderful. You cannot make a nurse, they are a certain kind of person. They do wonders.”

The importance of ‘being held in mind.’ (PAWL,1995)

“Every day Teresa gives me my tea just how I like it and always with a lovely, big smile.  She is so kind with me. ”

“ I think this Trust chooses it’s nurses because of how friendly they are.”

• Quality

• Safe

• Caring

Link between patient experience and staff experienceMichael West research demonstrates:

• There is a substantial amount of recent evidence that the experiences of• staff, particularly in the form of support received from

supervisors and others, and• staff engagement, are associated with the care provided to

patients, in the form of• patient satisfaction, health outcomes, and ratings of quality of

care, as well as staff• absenteeism and turnover

NHS Employers, 2014

This is a key area of focus for us in the Trust

A strong focus on Patient Safety

• Sharing Achievements• Focus on improving patient safety at all levels in the

organisation• Safety huddles• Measuring and reporting improvements back to staff• Engaging patients and carers in helping staff to improve

the quality and safety of patient care• Bringing teams together with Patient Safety Days• Time away from the workplace to work as a team to listen

to each other and develop action plans• Patient safety as part of our Trust Values• Training for Human Factors, debriefing

Serious Untoward Incidents (SUI’s) and Serious Learning Events (SLE’s) • Incident reporting highly encouraged within the Trust• Reflection core component of the learning experience• Serious incidents offered team debriefing and support

from clinical psychologists part of the Health and Wellbeing support offered by the Trust.

• Team reflection and action planning essential• Investigations undertaken at an appropriate time and with

trained investigators who are non-judgemental• Team feedback is given• Any subsequent actions for any individuals are taken

following a robust investigation process

Patients at the Heart of what we do:• Understanding and Communicating our shared

purpose • Values centric at all times throughout the

employee journey• Commitment to dignified and compassionate

care for frail older people explicit to all staff• Patient experience feedback from more than

50,000 people every year• Measuring what matters most to patients in a

variety of ways, at different points of care and communicating this to staff

• Real time measurement fed back to clinical teams within 24 hours and utilised to support improvement work at Patient Safety Days

• Recent work focussed on the contribution of corporate services to ‘Our Shared Purpose’

Partnership Working with Staff Side:• True partnership approach to working with staff side

through forums such as Trust Partnership Forum• Dedicated Staff Side representation on key

developments such as Northumbria Specialist Emergency Care Hospital

• Staff Side representation on key accountable sub committees of the Board such as of Workforce Committee, Assurance Committee etc

• Good working relationships with Staff Side Chair and Vice Chair

• Regular scheduled meetings with the Executive Director of HR/OD and Chief Executive to discuss contemporary issues

• Joint Communications between Staff Side Chair and Chief Executive e.g. Francis Report outcome

Communications:• Regular methods of Staff communication

including Chief Executive’s Roadshows, Weekly Staff Update, Personal Communications from the Chief Executive, Staff Magazine (quarterly), Team Brief

• Board walkabouts• Staff Awards Ceremony• Screensavers on contemporary issues

consistent across the Trust• Campaigns such as #hellomynameis and

NHS Change Day promoted with staff across all sites.

In Summary• Developing “The Northumbria Way” has taken

time and a concerted effort• Being open and transparent requires commitment

from everyone• The Trust’s “Proud” programme includes staff

being proud to raise concerns • Multi-disciplinary approach, equity across all staff

groups.• Concerns raised at all times taken seriously,

investigated and responded to.

Any Questions?Thank you.