Knowledge @lert for Friday 20th February

February 20, 2015 Daily News

Literature Search Service – Southport & Ormskirk Library & Knowledge Service
We offer a specialised enquiry and literature search service. Let us know what information you need and we will do the searching for you. We carry out complex searches on databases such as The Cochrane Library, Medline, CINAHL, PsycINFO and NHS Evidence to find the best available evidence to support the work of staff across the Trust.

Foundation Trust sector deficit five times higher than planned – Health Service Journal 
The Foundation Trust sector has reported a deficit of £321m, which is five times more than planned, according to the regulator Monitor.

Trust and GPs bid to create primary care joint venture – Health Service Journal 
A group of Hampshire GPs has teamed up with the country’s largest mental health and community services trust in a bid to create an integrated primary care centre.

Why our NHS should listen and be human: this is what the public are telling us – The Patients Association 
This report highlights that far too many patients are still experiencing unacceptable standards of care within the health and social care system. It includes patient stories and experiences of care within the NHS to illustrate the gap between patient experience and the commitments of the NHS Constitution.

Lithium Care Pathway
NICE has added The Impact of Introducing a Lithium Care Pathway to its shared learning database. This audit highlights the impact of introducing a Li care pathway for patients over 65 years attending an old age psychiatry service.at South Eastern Health and Social Care Trust

 

Demystifying theory and its use in improvement –  BMJ Qual Saf 2015;24:228-238 
The role and value of theory in improvement work in healthcare has been seriously underrecognised. We join others in proposing that more informed use of theory can strengthen improvement programmes and facilitate the evaluation of their effectiveness. Many professionals, including improvement practitioners, are unfortunately mystified—and alienated—by theory, which discourages them from using it in their work. In an effort to demystify theory we make the point in this paper that, far from being discretionary or superfluous, theory (‘reason-giving’), both informal and formal, is intimately woven into virtually all human endeavour. We explore the special characteristics of grand, mid-range and programme theory; consider the consequences of misusing theory or failing to use it; review the process of developing and applying programme theory; examine some emerging criteria of ‘good’ theory; and emphasise the value, as well as the challenge, of combining informal experience-based theory with formal, publicly developed theory. We conclude that although informal theory is always at work in improvement, practitioners are often not aware of it or do not make it explicit. The germane issue for improvement practitioners, therefore, is not whether they use theory but whether they make explicit the particular theory or theories, informal and formal, they actually use.

Clinically led performance management in secondary healthcare: evaluating the attitudes of medical and non-clinical managers. BMJ Qual Saf 2015;24:212-220
Improving the quality and activity of clinicians’ practice improves patient care. Performance-related human resource management (HRM) is an established approach to improving individual practice but with limited use among clinicians. A framework for performance-related HRM was developed from successful practice in non-healthcare organisations centred on distributive leadership and locally provided, validated and interpreted performance measurement. This study evaluated the response of medical and non-clinical managers to its implementation into a large secondary healthcare organisation.

Improving Students’ Safety Practice Behaviors Through a Simulation-Based Learning Experience – Journal of Nursing Education 2015;54(x, Suppl.):xx–xx
This study evaluated 175 senior-level undergraduate nursing students’ perceptions and comfort level regarding safety principles and practices before and after participating in a safety-focused clinical simulation-based experience during their nursing leadership course. The Healthcare Professionals Patient Safety Assessment (HPPSA) was used to measure students’ perceptions and comfort level regarding patient safety practices. Respondents rated their level of agreement about statements related to errors and safety in health care, their comfort level in reporting and disclosing an error, and whether they had seen, disclosed, or reported an error. The t test for the HPPSA Part 2 was statistically significant (n = 153, t = 2.78, p = 0.006) with mean pretest and posttest scores of 16.95 (SD = 3.44) and 17.69 (SD = 3.25), respectively. The findings suggest simulation is a teaching strategy that may contribute to increasing undergraduate nursing students’ comfort with reporting or investigating errors.

New heart attack test could ‘significantly reduce burden’ on hospitals – Nursing Times
A new test that rules out myocardial infarction could reduce hospital admissions by as much as 40% for patients with chest pain, according to UK researchers.

NICE gives green light to two treatments for diabetic eye condition – Nursing Times
The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence has preliminary support for two new options for the treatment of diabetic macular oedema.

Rationing in the NHS
The Nuffield Trust has published Rationing in the NHS, the second in a series of briefings published in the run up to the general election.  This briefing provides an overview of the current difficulties in making decisions about rationing healthcare in England, and setting out some of the challenges faced by policy makers in the future.  It warns policymakers and commissioners not to overestimate the ability of rationing approaches to reduce NHS expenditure. The briefing argues that despite the lack of public support for rationing decisions, there is room to improve the level of transparency in the system. It suggests a greater use of public consultation and better communication about local commissioning decisions.

Advisory Committee on Antimicrobial Resistance annual report
The Department of Health has published Advisory committee on antimicrobial resistance and healthcare associated infections 5thannual report 2013-2014.  The report highlights that resistance to antimicrobials (antibiotics, antifungals and antivirals) continues to increase. The report stresses that despite increased public awareness of the danger of antibiotic resistance, the amount of antibiotics being prescribed in the UK continues to rise.   It concludes that there is a clear need to educate the public about using antibiotics only when they are really needed, and a need to ensure that doctors always prescribe according to professional guidance. 

New tariff option for providers for 2015/16
The Chief Executives of both NHS England and Monitor have written to providers of NHS-funded services setting out a new enhanced tariff option for 2015-16. The amount is worth up to £500m more to providers than the original package that was consulted on last November, which was prior to extra funding being made available to the NHS in December’s autumn statement.

Online resources for GPs treating dementia patients
The General Medical Council has collated a collection of tools and resources to help GP’s provide better care for older people with dementia and mental health issues.  The resources are part of the GMC’s online resource which supports doctors treating older patients. New updates to the resource include a ‘mythbusters’ leaflet tackling five common myths related to treating patients with dementia.

Statistics

Knowledge @lert for Wednesday 18th February

Knowledge @lert for Tuesday 24th February