Allied Health CCDM spot light - Waitemata DHB
At Waitemata DHB allied health clinicians are based in their own departments, and are not allocated to specific wards or units.
Staffing levels across the wards can very daily due to vacancies and leave. There was no visibility of allied health staffing capacity each day across both the North Shore and Waitakere Hospital sites.
The allied health team also had no single communication strategy to communicate capacity across each inpatient wards. Team leaders would email charge nurse managers with any significant capacity concerns as they occurred.
Allied health clinicians would then communicate workload requirements via meetings and cells phones to reallocate resources according to clinical need and priority of each patient.
Capacity at a glance (CAAG)
Capacity at a glance (CAAG) is an electronic board displaying information about bed availability on our inpatient wards, Elective Surgery Centre, Emergency Departments and Assessment & Diagnostic Units. CAAG boards give an overall view of bed availability however there is minimal patient information.
Using this technology as a base, the allied health team wanted visibility on the CAAG boards so that each day they can see allied health staffing capacity, and where allied health staff are needed within the hospital. This will help the allied health team prioritise their workload, and ensure patient care and assessments are completed.
The tool uses a traffic light system with green showing standard staffing through to red indicating a critical care capacity deficit. Variance indicators guide a consistent and transparent approach to defining capacity and will help us streamline and integrate the service provided to our patients.
What have we done
The allied health capacity at a glance tool has been developed through two separate "pen and paper" trials to determine the appropriate variance colour indicators.
This was achieved manually using spreadsheets and creating the view and emailing out the information to the allied health teams on a daily basis.
Extensive consultation was undertaking with key stakeholders including all allied health disciplines and nursing groups.
Where to from here
The Allied Health CAAG tool has been successfully trialled with an immediate improvement in the communication and management of allied health capacity on a daily basis across both hospital sites. Staff have also found the tool to be very informative and clear.
The electronic Allied Health CAAG tool is now under development and will be live in due course.
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