Current projects

In this section we highlight some of the projects we are currently working on

The work we do is split into three main workstreams as shown in this diagram.

Activities where we provide digital oversight across West Yorkshire;

Digital social care records pilot - From funding made available via The Digitising Social Care Team in the NHS Transformation Directorate, West Yorkshire are supporting their CQC registered adult social care providers to adopt technologies and transform care. A programme of work is underway to support the adult social care sector to adopt digital social care records (DSCR), also known as digital care plans, to ensure care teams have the most accurate and timely information at their fingertips to provide outstanding care. Digital social care records play an important role in joining up the NHS and social care, releasing more time for staff to dedicate to care, and equipping staff with the information they need at the point of care. Year 1 of implementation will provide a basis for learning to enable the development of a replicable, streamlined approach to support in achieving our ambition of ensuring 80% of social care providers to have digitised care records in place by March 2024.
EeRS for community optometry - The North East and Yorkshire regional team have procured a single referral system for community optometrists to refer into secondary care. They can also use the system for advice and guidance to reduce the number of referrals. A pilot exercise is being planned to take place within Calderdale.
eRostering - ensures the workforce are appropriately allocated to provide efficient and quality patient care /eJob planning - a digital prospective professional agreement detailing how much of a clinician’s time is spent on direct clinical care, supporting professional activities and other NHS or external responsibilities
Healthier together website - The West Yorkshire Healthier Together website provides consistent, accurate and trustworthy healthcare advice for parents, carers, young people, and professionals.

West Yorkshire Healthier Together is a free to user website developed by local healthcare professionals to help parents and carers keep their children safe and healthy. It has a wide range of information and is available by visiting www.wyhealthiertogether.nhs.uk
The advice given on the website complements local advice given across health and care services. Information has been ratified and reviewed by local paediatricians, GPs, community pharmacists, health visitors and other professionals across the region to ensure it is the most current and up to date information available.

The website launched on 27 June 2022 with the following sections:
I’m worried about:

-my baby under 3 months
-my child over 3 months
-should my child go to school or nursery
-keeping my child healthy

The WY Healthier Together team are now working with young people and professionals to develop a suite of young people’s pages.

MyCOPD
MyMobility app
Laboratory Information Management System (LIMS) / Enterprise ICE
Optometry anterior segment imaging transfer - The West Yorkshire Eye Care Programme are working with a selection of community optometrists from across Calderdale to use anterior segment imaging devices to take images of eyes that can be shared with secondary care to seek advice and guidance on whether a patient should be referred to secondary care, or whether they can be treated in community.
National pathology imaging collaborative / Yorkshire Imaging Collaborative (YIC) - creates a consistent and high-quality medical imaging service across the largest geographical footprint in the UK.

The Yorkshire Imaging Collaborative (YIC) is a transformation programme enabled by technology. It comprises 28 hospitals across nine NHS trusts, supporting a population of more than four million people. The Collaborative aims to provide a technically connected radiology service that is responsive to the current and evolving needs of patients. By adopting a common technical solution, radiology services will be able to deliver on-demand availability of images and reports at the point of care, no matter where patients travel for care within the network. 

In addition, through the purchase of additional technology, the Collaborative aims to balance reporting capacity with demand for reporting across its member trusts.  

To improve the work-life balance of radiologists across the region, diagnostic standard homeworking computers are being rolled out to all colleagues who wish to be able to work from home. 

There is a focus to create a sustainable and resilient radiology workforce, with the ability to facilitate outstanding development and training opportunities and be the employer of choice in England. 

The programme aims to reduce clinical variation through the adoption of standardised imaging and reporting protocols. This means that patients will receive the same type of scan, regardless of which hospital they attend, depending on their needs and according to clinical presentation. 
Scan4Safety - a pioneering initiative led by the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) that is enabling the delivery of better patient care, improved clinical productivity and supply chain efficiency in the NHS
TytoCare remote monitoring - an exam kit for accurate diagnosis and treatment

Activities where we lead digital delivery

Community digitisation
Digital inclusion
Electronic letters between trusts
GP to community pharmacy communications
GP online consultation increased utilisation
GP online consultation reprocurement
Remote monitoring scoping - a digital solution which has the capability to capture clinical information about a patient from their home (with or without the use of a device) and to share this information virtually with a clinical team based elsewhere, to support decision making about their care
Digital primary care innovation hub
Video consultation reprocurement
West Yorkshire digital strategy / place based strategies
Yorkshire and Humber Care Record community pharmacy pilot
Yorkshire and Humber Care Record end of life data sharing
Yorkshire and Humber Care Record maternity data sharing
Yorkshire and Humber Care Record shared care record
Yorkshire and Humber Care Record transfer of care

Activities where we provide digital support to priority programmes

Improving population health

Prevention
Health inequalities
Wider determinants of health and wellbeing
Personalised care

Priority areas for improving outcomes

Cancer
Mental health, learning disabilities and autism
Children, young people and families
Carers
Maternity

System change and integration

Primary and community care
System change and integration
Urgent and emergency care
Improving planned care
Hospitals working together

Enablers

Power of communities
Workforce
Digital and interoperability
Capital and estates
Leadership and organisational development
Population health management
Innovation and improvement
Finance
Commissioning development

Digital top tips

We all love a top tip to help make things quicker, easier and more effective. If you've got a tip tip to share please do let us know by contacting our team inbox: wyhcp.digital@nhs.net and we will post our favourites on this page.

Have a look at these nice tricks posted on LinkedIn which will help make working in Excel much easier
Use Chrome or Edge as your internet browser when opening links such as for eventbrite – the Internet Explorer browser is now unreliable and is unsupported on many websites
If you’re having connection issues when you're in a video call, it might help to switch off your video
Follow these tips for reducing background noise when you’re on MS Teams

Working collaboratively

Effective communication between prescribers and community pharmacies is an essential element of a positive patient experience. When something goes wrong, or there are questions about the prescription, this can cause delays and uncertainty for patients - who often end up being the ‘communication bridge’ between their GP and Pharmacist.

We are working with The Clarity Practice to identify how these issues occur, and what can be done to improve communications and information flow between GPs and other prescribers and those dispensing to patients across the region. Working together we will seek input from patient groups, prescribers and those dispensing within the community. We will also consult national bodies and systems teams.

This exciting project is a continuation of work undertaken by The Clarity Practice in other regions under the Digital Primary Care Accelerator Fund and will focus on a specific area that patients have highlighted as an opportunity for improvement.

Joined up maternity care

The hospital trusts in West Yorkshire and Harrogate are carrying out a project to use the Yorkshire and Humber Care Record (YCHR) technology to share maternity summary documents between each organisation.

Currently, information is stored in six different maternity systems - and potentially in none-maternity systems too. This may be because maternity patients visit several healthcare settings. The record, centred around the mother and child, will enable data sharing across several maternity systems transparently and safely.

Improved connectivity and integration will provide clinical and care staff directly involved in the mother’s care access to the most up to date information. It means they’ll be able to view real time maternity information across care providers and between different IT systems safely and securely.

See the maternity programme information pages for more information.

What good looks like

NHSX held a webinar in February focusing on what good looks like. The what good looks like framework aims to:

Empower frontline leaders, so a CEO can see whether their organisation is doing everything it should be doing
Create a common vision for good digital practice across health and care, which can inform CQC inspections and the other formal system levers
Create a model for digital maturity that will allow us to assess providers and systems
Generate national insights on respective systems journeys
Understand and be able to customise the right support offer for local systems
Create a vibrant community for sharing good practice to accelerate digital transformation across health and care

See the presentation for more information.

Integrated health and care record

A key component of our digital strategy is shared care records. The Partnership’s Digital Programme leads the rollout of shared records in West Yorkshire in partnership with the central Yorkshire and Humber Care Record team.

We are 1 of 5 Local Health and Care Record Exemplars to facilitate information sharing across organisations to improve care and patient experience.

Yorkshire & Humber Care Record works across the region with all types of health and care providers. In doing so it has meant build technical capability to ensure no organisation gets left behind. See the building technical capability and welcoming new connections news article on the Yorkshire & Humber Care Record website for more info.

My Pregnancy Journey

The My Pregnancy Journey digital tool contains information about the choices available to pregnant women and their families, helping them to choose the provider of their antenatal, intrapartum and postnatal care, and to make decisions about their care at these times. The tool is easy to use and offers a function that allows women to find out about services close to and convenient for them and is available round the clock. Also see the My Pregnancy Journey news article for more information.

Video consultation

Most GP surgeries can offer a video consultation. This is very similar to a face-to-face appointment and is where you speak to a doctor using the video camera in your smartphone, tablet or computer. The number of video consultations has increased rapidly over the last few months reducing the need to travel and safeguarding both patients and frontline staff.

We have agreed to award a 12-month video consultation contract for primary and secondary care for the region, to provide some stability to clinicians during the COVID-19 peak. The contract will start when the current national one ends on 1 April 2021. It will allow sufficient time to do a thorough procurement exercise for a permanent solution once the peak starts to reduce.

If you need to have a video call, you will get a text or email from your GP surgery with a date and time. Find out more about how to have a video call.

GP Online Consultation

GP Online Consultation is a convenient way for patients to contact their GP practice without having to queue on the phone or take time out of their busy lifestyles to come into the practice. With a few clicks using a smartphone, tablet or computer, people can contact their GP practices about a new problem or an ongoing issue.