It is with a great deal of personal pride that we present this annual review. It reflects a year that brought many achievements and some notable improvements in patient care.
Few NHS organisations can celebrate being at the forefront of medical innovation for over 175 years, but for our Trust, the responsibility to push boundaries and break new ground in treating heart and lung disease lies at our core.
Today we are the only NHS trust in the country with a total artificial heart programme, and our cystic fibrosis experts are pioneering opportunities in remote digital care. You will read about both initiatives in this review, and many others.
In partnership with academic institutions, the pharmaceutical industry and device manufacturers, our teams work hard to harness new technology and deliver the very highest standards of patient care.
This year alone over 2,000 patients were recruited to 200 research programmes that will contribute towards better patient care and outcomes, and our teams attracted more than £7.9 million in external grants for research.
The year has also seen significant advances in the way we deliver care as a result of a major transformational programme Trust-wide. The Darwin programme reviews how we provide our specialist services and through comprehensive engagement with staff and patients, ensures best practice becomes standard practice, identifies and removes inefficiencies, and in some cases completely redesigns the treatments we offer.
There have been some impressive milestones in the programme’s first year of operation and the challenge set by Darwin to all teams has been embraced across the organisation. A key area of focus has been on reducing the length of stay after procedures and getting patients back to their homes and families sooner.
So at Harefield Hospital cardiology patients can now have an invasive procedure, recover in a comfortable chair and go home the same day, thanks to an innovative new ‘lounge’ developed by our specialists. The cardiology lounge provides a quiet, comfortable space, where patients relax in lounge chairs as they recover from their procedure in the cardiac catheter laboratories.
Patients have been enthusiastic about the new lounge, with 100 per cent of those surveyed after their visit saying they were “very satisfied” with the service.
And at Royal Brompton Hospital the Squire Centre offers patients the chance to come in to hospital on the day of a procedure (such as angioplasty) rather than stay the night before.
The centre combines a pre-assessment clinic with a day-case unit, and almost two thirds of patients seen in the unit have been able to go home the same day, eliminating the need for any overnight stay at all. More than 90 per cent of patient feedback has been positive.
It is our focus on transforming and advancing treatment for patients with heart and lung disease that is the inspiration behind our planned collaboration with King’s Health Partners1. Our clinical teams have been working together over the past 12 months to design a new approach which we think can revolutionise heart and lung care and research in the UK. We are working to redesign how we deliver services, research and education across the partnership and beyond – from services in the community, to specialist inpatient care, to laboratory-based research.
This year will see a major public consultation on our plans and we look forward to working with patients and staff on this bold and exciting partnership which has the potential to benefit up to 15 million children and adults in London and beyond. We look forward to updating you on our progress.
31 January 2019
1 King's Health Partners comprises Guy's and St Thomas', King's College Hospital, and South London and Maudsley NHS Foundation Trusts and King's College London University.