Established to inspire and celebrate collaborative working, Integrated Neighbourhood Teams (INTs) are a national initiative to improve the health and well-being of local communities. Made up of primary care services, community care, mental health, specialist hospitals, care homes, local authorities, and social care, to name a few, INTs ensure residents’ wellbeing is more of a partnership rather than providing single unconnected episodes of care. They aim to reduce inequalities, improve the health of the population, and ensure high-quality, accessible and efficient services are provided, to support patients and their families with long-term conditions and complex health needs.
How Consultant Connect can help
Our Enhanced Advice & Guidance service is already utilised across over half of the NHS in England, Scotland, and Wales, connecting healthcare professionals for rapid clinical discussions. Our technology supports the ‘right care in the right place the first time’ ethos, ensuring that patients are seen in the best environment for their needs and receive timely treatment. Recent benchmark data* has shown that 70% of all calls to elective care specialties avoided an unnecessary hospital visit, allowing patients to receive treatment in the community when clinically appropriate.
To support INTs, our tech can be implemented to facilitate IG-secure communications between multiple teams, bridging the gap between services. Our platform operates as a single point of access, allowing a range of experts within INTs to conveniently manage patients in different locations and knowledge-share with colleagues. Using Consultant Connect can help coordinate teams of different healthcare professionals and bring them together to support patients via telephone, photo messaging, or a combination of both.
Telephone Advice & Guidance
- Using the free Consultant Connect App or the desktop browser, users can make calls at the touch of a button to a range of specialties. Calls are answered within 30 seconds on average.
- All calls are recorded for medico-legal reasons and can be downloaded and listened to at any time.
- Inputting the patient’s NHS number and leaving a call outcome enables the patient’s onward journey to be tracked, and the efficiency of the service monitored.
Photo Messaging Advice & Guidance
- With our built-in patient consent step, teams can use the app to take IG-secure clinical images which can be forwarded for advice.
- Clinical images/videos taken outside of the Consultant Connect App can be attached to messages for advice via the desktop browser.
- Specialty teams can create bespoke proformas to ensure the necessary patient information is captured to provide accurate and detailed guidance.
- Additional users can be added to ongoing messages to support informed decision-making and shared working.
- Ongoing and closed cases can be downloaded as PDFs at any time to attach to external files.
PhotoSAF
- The IG-secure secure clinical photography feature, PhotoSAF, enables users of the app to take and store patient photos for external use or to monitor conditions.
- Images are not saved to the device but are stored in the secure cloud, where they can be accessed and downloaded at any time via the desktop browser.
- Users can type or dictate notes to sit alongside the images for additional context.
GP Bypass Numbers
- Accessed via the app, users can benefit from skipping the queue on switchboard to speak directly with staff at local GP surgeries.
- To save users from searching for a phone number elsewhere, when a Bypass Number is not available, the main number is clearly labelled and easily distinguishable.
* Data correct as of September 2024.
If you would like to discuss how Consultant Connect can support your INT in providing more joined-up care, please contact us on hello@consultantconnect.org.uk or 01865 261467.
Related materials:
- Exclusive preview: impact of Enhanced Advice & Guidance
- NHS winter funding applications
- Meeting the requirements of NHSE’s SPoA guidance
- Proven approaches to meet the NHSE targets
