Kim Russon

In September the Anaesthesia and Perioperative Medicine GIRFT (Get It Right First Time) team visited my Trust, which was very enlightening. For those of you not familiar with GIRFT, it began as a pilot within Orthopaedics led by Professor Tim Briggs an orthopaedic surgeon. Variation in practice was identified which was thought to be impacting on quality of care and patient outcomes, so the programme was rolled out nationally with the intention to “identify areas of good practice and agree where changes can be made”.  GIRFT is working through the specialities and has published a number of specialty reports available via their website. Day surgery has been identified as an area with significant national variation.

From the perspective of having GIRFT visit my Trust it was a positive experience. GIRFT expect representation from clinicians, managers and the Executive team. The data presented was little bit out of date, but it was based on the Trust’s HES data so needed to be considered. If the data is not presenting what you are expecting, then you need to look at how it is being recorded and how it is being submitted. It is your Trust’s data.

Based on GIRFT data and Model Hospital data, BADS has identified there is wide national variation in day case rates for Anterior Cruciate Ligament reconstruction and thus are planning a joint BADS / HCC conference “From ACLr to Total Knee replacement as day case” on 30th April 2020 in London. Members of the GIRFT team will be presenting at our Joint BADS /HCC conference on Day case General Surgery in Birmingham on 21^st January 2020 and our annual conference in June in Cardiff, discussing variation and how it might be addressed. I am looking forward to hearing from them and hope you will consider joining us.

The Model Hospital is a way of monitoring your hospital’s day case rates. This is provided by NHS Improvement and is accessible by anyone who has an NHS email address. Dr Mary Stocker, past president of BADS, has been working very closely with the Model Hospital team and the latest version has been launched this week which maps to the BADS Directory of Procedures 6th Edition. The day surgery module can show your overall rates, by speciality, by procedure and show how your rates compare nationally. This information is based on HES data so ensuring you Trust data is correct is key. Are your patients planned / listed as a day case and then successfully go home the same day and recorded as such?

In the last couple of months BADS has received the very sad news of the deaths of Dr Lawrence Rowe, who was pivotal in the development of the current BADS website and Professor Paul Jarrett, who was a founder member of the society and a past president. BADS is hugely indebted to them and further detail of their remarkable work can be found on the BADS website. My thanks to Dr Anna Lipp who has written Dr Rowe’s obituary published in this edition of JODS which is to be shared with SIVA (Society of Intravenous Anaesthesia) where he also had a huge involvement. Professor Jarrett’s obituary will be published in the next edition of JODS. I extend my condolences to their families at this sad time.

In addition to the new council members whose biographies you can read in this edition of JODS, I would like to welcome 3 co-opted members: Mr Richard Parkinson (British Orthopaedic Association), Dr Stamatios Karavolos (Royal College of Obstetrics & Gynaecology) and  Mr. Andrei Tanase (Association of Surgeons in Training).

My thanks to everyone for promoting and progressing day surgery and all the best for the rest of 2019.