NHS Cheshire and Merseyside’s three-year plan to improve mental health services has highlighted the role of data as a “key enabler” in realigning services so that inpatient provision better fits the needs of the population, following a self-assessment involving multiple stakeholders.
Focusing on the quality of the service’s inpatient offer, flow through inpatient services and community alternatives to inpatient provision, the plan places emphasis on the need for co-production with those with lived experience; workforce development; improved collaboration; and improved leadership and governance.
With data as a key enabler, the plan points to gaps in current visibility, signalling that closing these gaps in reporting will be a priority for the year to help ensure that the service is meeting the needs of local populations. These efforts to improve data quality and reporting will inform plans for years two and three, with the goal of having a “comprehensive understanding” of population needs, demand and capacity to support strategic and financial planning for the service.
Data also feeds into other parts of the plan for the coming three years, including in improving accessibility and inclusivity of services, enhancing step-up and step-down provision in the community to prevent “unintentional harms” identified for people who remain in hospital longer than they need to be, and ensuring the delivery of equitable services.
The plan also notes the development of the ICS’s system flow programme and its investment in SHREWD real-time reporting, with hopes that it will “allow for improved data and insight into the demands in the system and reasons why”.
For adult mental health, year one of the plan focuses on addressing barriers to discharge through improved data reporting, and increasing data quality to support the monitoring of progress and the identification of priority areas. Year two will look to use data to identify gaps in community and inpatient provision, improving flow; and year three will look ahead to redesigning pathways and planning for future investment to ensure “best use of available resource”.
Improving data reporting and using data to identify gaps in provision is also central to the three-year plans for rehabilitation, learning disability, and provision for autistic people, where it will again be utilised in planning for future demand and capacity.
To read the three-year plan in full, please click here.
Digital and data in Cheshire and Merseyside
Earlier this year, HTN reported on the upcoming launch of a tender for a new telehealth platform in Cheshire and Merseyside, which would focus on procuring a flexible system capable of connecting with “more existing and future applications and hardware.
The ICB also published its Access Improvement Plan, which highlighted the role of digital and technology in improving access to healthcare, with “expected improvements” for patients including “less hurdles” and “clear information” when accessing services, set times for online consultations, a choice of appointment methods, and a better understanding of the apps and technologies in place for those choosing to use it.
The role of data in setting strategy and operational goals
Elsewhere in the NHS, data is playing a role in the setting of strategy and operational goals, with NHSE highlighting the need for “robust and consistent data” for services such as virtual wards.
In South Yorkshire, the ICS’s data and insights strategy for 2024 – 2026 set out ambitions to build an intelligence-led system using data to improve health and wellbeing outcomes and experiences, with focus on evaluating care pathways, improving population understanding and tackling health inequalities.
A HTN Now panel discussion in August reflected on some of the challenges around bias in healthcare data, focusing-in on the importance of building a foundation from solid and reliable data, and how this can help to support innovation and the use of technologies such as AI in healthcare.
