You told parliament yesterday that it was time for “an honest conversation with the public about their use of A&E“. Are you up for one too, as Secretary of State?
Unfortunately there is no evidence of honest conversations, cajoling, beating or any other persuasive endeavour having the slightest effect on patient behaviour in seeking healthcare. You may even be stoking demand simply by talking about it (as the Behavioural Insights Team has shown.) Dr Taj Hassan is spot on when he says it’s about the system. As Deming said, 95% of the problem is the system, and that’s where leaders spend their efforts.
You’re fiddling with four hour targets, and the language of targets, but Deming said 35 years ago, “numerical targets must be eliminated”, tellingly calling his book “Out of the Crisis.” It wasn’t until 1992 and after mental torment over what this meant that I personally got it. Well, the next principle is to eliminate exhortations…
It’s crucial to understand the difference between targets and measures, and to Deming (a statistician) measures were absolutely critical. It matters to patients how soon they are seen Mr Hunt, and therefore it must matter to you and all NHS staff: measure the times, the demands and the flow in A&E and strive continually to improve them.
You’ll be asking me how in a minute, but look, read Simon Dodds on how they did it in Luton and Dunstable hospital. There’s a very simple parallel to what they did and our work in primary care: put the senior clinician at the front of the house where the demand comes in. It saves time for the senior clinicians and saves time for everyone else.
I spent yesterday in Riverside Practice, Portadown, NI, on the day they launched their new system. Patients reported an average 39 minutes to be in touch with their GP. 81% said the new system was better. The GPs said it had gone much better than expected, and when they’d cleared the decks, most of them went home early. Someone please pass this on to Helen Stokes-Lampard who is threatening us with 4 week waits.
Wonderful stories came throughout the day. The man who got the GP call in the library. The woman who broke the new rules, turning up in the surgery without calling, but with agonising back pain. She saw the doctor within minutes. Any healthcare system which doesn’t have compassion at its heart is worthless.
Riverside GP has gone from having one of the worst access records in NI to one of the best, overnight. OK, so the preparation took four weeks. OK, so it took a year for the GPs to overcome their fear of change. But they changed overnight.
Leave aside political shocks for a minute, there’s a medical earthquake happening in NI right now, standing primary care the right way up.
It’s such a dreadful shame that NHS England is missing out, but I’m sitting by the phone Mr Hunt.
Dear Mr Hunt
You told parliament yesterday that it was time for “an honest conversation with the public about their use of A&E“. Are you up for one too, as Secretary of State?
Unfortunately there is no evidence of honest conversations, cajoling, beating or any other persuasive endeavour having the slightest effect on patient behaviour in seeking healthcare. You may even be stoking demand simply by talking about it (as the Behavioural Insights Team has shown.) Dr Taj Hassan is spot on when he says it’s about the system. As Deming said, 95% of the problem is the system, and that’s where leaders spend their efforts.
You’re fiddling with four hour targets, and the language of targets, but Deming said 35 years ago, “numerical targets must be eliminated”, tellingly calling his book “Out of the Crisis.” It wasn’t until 1992 and after mental torment over what this meant that I personally got it. Well, the next principle is to eliminate exhortations…
It’s crucial to understand the difference between targets and measures, and to Deming (a statistician) measures were absolutely critical. It matters to patients how soon they are seen Mr Hunt, and therefore it must matter to you and all NHS staff: measure the times, the demands and the flow in A&E and strive continually to improve them.
You’ll be asking me how in a minute, but look, read Simon Dodds on how they did it in Luton and Dunstable hospital. There’s a very simple parallel to what they did and our work in primary care: put the senior clinician at the front of the house where the demand comes in. It saves time for the senior clinicians and saves time for everyone else.
I spent yesterday in Riverside Practice, Portadown, NI, on the day they launched their new system. Patients reported an average 39 minutes to be in touch with their GP. 81% said the new system was better. The GPs said it had gone much better than expected, and when they’d cleared the decks, most of them went home early. Someone please pass this on to Helen Stokes-Lampard who is threatening us with 4 week waits.
Wonderful stories came throughout the day. The man who got the GP call in the library. The woman who broke the new rules, turning up in the surgery without calling, but with agonising back pain. She saw the doctor within minutes. Any healthcare system which doesn’t have compassion at its heart is worthless.
Riverside GP has gone from having one of the worst access records in NI to one of the best, overnight. OK, so the preparation took four weeks. OK, so it took a year for the GPs to overcome their fear of change. But they changed overnight.
Leave aside political shocks for a minute, there’s a medical earthquake happening in NI right now, standing primary care the right way up.
It’s such a dreadful shame that NHS England is missing out, but I’m sitting by the phone Mr Hunt.
Yours sincerely,
Harry Longman
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