Achieving Healthcare Standards and improving patient care in Radiotherapy

Radiotherapy departments face a constant challenge in balancing the demands of an accreditation process with the need to provide excellent and continuous patient care. High quality standards ensure that patient care is safe, but the associated audits and peer reviews can be time-consuming and resource-intensive on already overstretched departments. 

The Mid and South Essex NHS Foundation Trust Radiotherapy department sought the expertise of CHKS as their accreditation partner, to support the accreditation process with minimal disruption to  the day to day running of the department.  

Nicolai Greet, Head of Radiotherapy at Mid and South Essex NHS Foundation Trust, provided four key points on how CHKS as an accreditation partner supported their Radiotherapy Department to achieve the ISO 9001:2015 Standard. The support of the accreditation partner helped to transform their approach to quality management within the department whilst simplifying the administrative burden and impact of the accreditation process.   

Improved Quality Management:  

CHKS as an accreditation partner was able to provide a structured framework for quality management which aligned to the auditors’ criteria. This helped guide the Trust on what regulatory standards it needed to meet in a quick and effective manner to ensure there was a minimal disruptive impact on the department. 
   
Nicolai had heard from colleagues that CHKS accreditation could help to streamline the audits into a single improvement process, meeting several different standards’ criteria: 

“I was confident the CHKS team had exactly what the department was looking for and would be able to help us streamline our auditing process and guide us through the accreditation process to help improve our patients’ experience,” she says.  

Supportive Approach:  

Radiotherapy departments are held to rigorous standards to ensure that patients receive treatment that’s safe and of the highest quality, and that their services are fit for purpose. This involves carrying out audits and peer reviews, which demand a significant amount of preparation and documentation, and the team at Mid and South Essex NHS FT wanted to ease this administrative burden.  

The CHKS team guide clients through the accreditation process step by step. A dedicated client manager provides continuous support and independent healthcare quality experts make site visits.   

It does, however, require effort and Nicolai says: “It’s not for the faint of heart – it’s about embracing quality improvement and continuously demonstrating that.”  

Prepared for the assessments, they had all the information they needed for submission to the regional Operational Delivery Network, which oversees local healthcare services and ensures that standards are maintained. Having the information ready to send, rather than having to compile it separately, saved a lot of time that Nicolai’s team could devote to caring for patients.  

This helped the Trust meet the various regulatory standards while reducing the administrative burden associated with audits. 

Enhanced Patient Experience:  

By focusing on the patient journey and addressing the softer side of care, CHKS helped the department improve the overall patient experience. 

Nicolai believes the accreditation process has helped the department to focus on the patient pathway and experience remembering that the patient is at the heart of everything it does.  
   
“The softer side of care, such as the first impression the patient gets when they enter the service, can sometimes get lost among the treatment standards,” she says.  
   
“CHKS looked at the department from the patient perspective and thought about the patient journey, and how it could be improved, which made us look at it differently too. For example, one small change the department has made to improve the patient experience is to reduce signage into a single television screen with rolling digital signs. This means that patients know at a glance where to go and have live updates on waiting times.”  

Collaborative approach:  

One of the benefits that she has seen throughout the accreditation process is improved communication with colleagues who became involved in the improvement journey.  

“The accreditation process has brought the whole team on board with the quality improvement objective,” she says. “CHKS accreditation has ensured that every member of the team understands what we’re trying to achieve, which includes getting ideas and feedback from everyone. It has certainly improved communication and cohesiveness among the team.”  

Nicolai feels that CHKS accreditation has been a catalyst for driving improvement, which will ultimately benefit patients. Her vision for the future is that the radiotherapy department continues to improve and uses what it’s learned from other departments in other hospitals to become a beacon of good practice. 

Radiotherapy Standard 

Understanding the complexities of a regulator’s standards and assessment processes in Radiotherapy can be challenging for healthcare providers.  
 
Download our sample Radiotherapy Standard to see how CHKS can support your healthcare assessment process: https://www.chks.co.uk/Download-Our-Radiotherapy-Standard 

CHKS  

The CHKS Assurance & Accreditation programme is based on a framework of evidence-based best practice standards which when implemented support the organisation on a quality improvement journey. An accreditation programme can be instrumental in helping your organisation’s Radiotherapydepartment implement the government inquiry’s recommendations, including adoption of best practice standards, fostering staff engagement, and cultivating a safer and more supportive culture.    

If you're interested in learning more about CHKS' accreditation programmes, please contact us to speak to an accreditation expert: https://www.chks.co.uk/Contact-Us