What 18 weeks has meant for the Radiology Department?
Accurate data collection is an essential part of the process to achieve the 18 week target. Not only does it actually help to achieve the target, but without it we won’t know how we are doing.
Last year a team from the Department of Health and the Strategic Health Authority visited the Trust and declared our 18 week referral to treatment data collection as ‘exemplar’.
Much work has been done on managing the input of 18 weeks data as well as on the technical side of the data return. Data collection for the inpatient part of the return hit 100% in August and has remained there every week since.
With this data we are now starting to analyse what clinical pathways are being treated within the 18 week goal and working closely with clinical staff on those that are not.
There has been considerable work in outpatients to achieve 100% data completion and we are almost there.
One thing of vital importance to help us achieve the 18 week wait time for patients is the outpatient outcome form that is attached to each patient’s case notes. This is completed by the doctor after each consultation to help track the patient’s pathway.