Implementing innovation and challenging the status quo within a healthcare system is commonly perceived as risky. To advocate for innovation and change, decision makers must understand exactly how implementing something new will positively impact the most important aspects of their hospital and what the return on their investment will be.
One lens through which we can measure benefits is the quadruple aim for healthcare, which seeks to optimise healthcare system performance by focussing on training education and wellbeing, improved patient experience, improved system efficiencies, and improved patient safety.
Proximie is unlocking benefits across all four aspects of the quadruple aim. To explain how this value can be realised at hospital system level we have built a calculator tool which allows you to input a number of operating theatres and get a reading on some of the impact created by Proximie.
For example, in a typical NHS Trust with an average of 22 operating theatres we estimate that:
Training education and wellbeing: Proximie can deliver 10,000 additional training hours – amounting to a monetary value of over £700,000 across the Trust. Using digital tools enables surgeons at every stage of their career to have access to the best training possible and not be constrained by geographical or opportunistic barriers. Through virtually scrubbing-in to giving access to complex or rare surgeries, learning from world leading surgeons and creating another place at the OR table which has been a challenge for new and training surgeons over the pandemic.
Improved patient experience: With an average of 2,651,000 surgeries currently conducted per year, it would take six months to clear the existing NHS surgical backlog alone, without any new treatment pathways beginning. This ever-growing list of patients waiting for surgery means surgical staff need to complete surgeries as efficiently as possible whilst ensuring patients don’t feel rushed through their care. Additionally, by recording every surgery, patients can get an instant second opinion and additional reassurance going into their surgery. Our recent patient survey results showed that almost half of patients support having their surgery recorded. We estimate that implementing Proximie and enabling consultants to scrub in from anywhere in the country avoids over 500 cancellations per year, with a cost saving of over £1.2m.
System efficiencies: Workforce is one of the NHS’ biggest challenges. The number of acute staff vacancies is rising dramatically. In Q1 of 2022/23, there were 90,967 acute staff vacancies. This is a 29% increase on the same quarter last year. To tackle the elective backlog, we need to make the best use possible of limited resources and not allow patient care to be compromised along the way. We estimate that implementing Proximie could deliver 297 more surgical cases per year, amounting to a monetary value of £600,000, and allowing significant progress on tackling the backlog to be made.
Improved patient safety: There is currently more than one never event occurring every day, alongside a consistent increase in the number of patient safety incidents in surgery since 2015. We estimate, through reducing adverse events and reducing negligence claims, that implementing Proximie could avoid 124 patient safety incidents per year, with a cost saving of over £700,000 for the trust and £2.6m in costs to NHS Resolution.
**Disclaimer: The calculations are based on national averages and aim to provide an indication of potential savings only. A number of assumptions were made in these calculations including the average number of harmful events per theatre per year, the average number of cases per theatre per year, average number of training hours delivered by consultants, and financial costs associated with them.
For more detail about the insight underlying our recommendations, the full white paper Patient safety in surgery: the urgent need for reform, can be read here.
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