The South West Venous Thromboembolism (VTE) Prevention Initiative has sought to support organisations in NHS South West to implement the recommendations made to the Chief Medical Officer in the report of the Independent Expert Working Group on the prevention of VTE in hospitalised patients.
Supporting the National VTE Prevention Programme by providing a practical approach to the implementation of national guidance, the initiative is aimed at reducing avoidable death and long term disability by ensuring that all hospitals providing inpatient care in NHS South West develop a systematic aproach to the prevention of venous thromboembolism. This programme is a key objective within the South West Strategic Health Authroity Strategic Framework for Improving Health and Healthcare in the south west and is part of a wider programme of work to improve quality and patient safety.
The initial focus of the South West initiative has been the review of VTE prevention strategies across all acute trusts, independent sector treatment centres and Primary Care Trust provider services (community hospitals). This has included: - Completion of self assessment questionnaires, enabling the Strategic Health Authority to gather baseline information on the approaches being taken to venous thromboembolism prevention and against which improvement can be measured over time;
- Clinically led peer review visits to each acute trust to validate the self assessment and speak to frontline clinical staff about the implementation of local VTE prevention strategies.
The peer review visits have provided the opportunity to idenitfy exemplar practice and share learning across the region. The aim of the review process is to support improvements so that all patients have a documented risk assessment on admission and are given appropriate prophylaxsis if needed. Documentation used during the assessment phase is provided here and has the potential to be used at a regional, health economy or orgaisational level.
There is a great deal of good work in progress across all of our hospitals, which was shared at a regional VTE Summit held in September 2009. Slide presentations from this successful event can be accessed here together with the programme.
NHS South West is delighted to be the first Strategic Health Authority that has been awarded VTE Exemplar Centre status. Work continues to ensure that improvement in VTE prevention is sustained across the region so that we achieve our vision that all Trusts in NHS South West become VTE Exemplar Centres.
For more information, please contact Julie Branter, Associate Director of Clinical Governance and Patient Safety at NHS South West: julie.branter@southwest.nhs.uk
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