We developed an alert which scans a whole health system for areas of health quality concern that need to be looked at and may need improvement.

Background

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, healthcare systems faced unprecedented challenges and reductions in some routine services.

Lancashire and South Cumbria needed a system that would help them remain focused on safe and effective care despite the ongoing pressures of the pandemic.

Action

NHS Midlands and Lancashire developed a Safety Siren to monitor quality at the system level.

The Safety Siren tracks an array of data, displays it visually and flags areas that may need a closer look. Its objective is not to draw a conclusion, but to signpost areas where further exploration could be worthwhile.

Some of the data the Safety Siren tracks includes:

• the Summary Hospital-level Mortality Indicators for each hospital
• condition-specific admission data (for example, lower-limb amputations)
• condition-specific mortality data (for example, fractured hip)
• excess mortality by council area (for example, the number of deaths that are and are not related to COVID-19)
• location of death (for example, home, hospital or care home)
• suicide rate for each area.

Impact

The real advantage of the Safety Siren is that it tracks data at the system level. This can feed into the new Integrated Care Board Quality Committee and help clinical leads know where to focus their attention and implement changes if necessary.

It also helps leads to plan ahead, with the ultimate goal of improving the health and quality of life of the local population.

The Safety Siren is a priority clinical report. The hope is that with time, the Safety Siren will become an embedded part of the new Integrated Care Board clinical governance.