Is technology a game-changer for healthcare staffing?

Few healthcare providers would disagree that the overwhelming issue currently facing them and likely to be facing them for years to come is one of staff retention and recruitment.  The recent Health and Social Care Committee report on Workforce recruitment and retention merely reiterated what we already know - there are significant, persistent vacancies across healthcare against a backdrop of growing demand.  

The solutions seem sound - proper workforce planning, increased pay and funding for training as well as tackling discrimination and increasing flexibility. But these are not quick fixes and not easy to achieve, particularly in light of current economic pressures.  Andin the meantime, the vacancy gap puts added pressure on existing staff …some of whom will then leave…increasing the vacancies. You get my drift.  So what can we do now to make things better?

There are many reasons why staff leave healthcare. However, it is clear that pressure, stress, culture and disillusionment of the quality of care provided to patients play a significant role.¹ Even if staff don’t leave, these factors can have a significant impact. In one month alone, the British Medical Association² found that 2 million days³ were lost to sickness, anxiety, stress or depression.

"After a shift spent firefighting, without proper time to talk to patients, you go home feeling like you didn’t do a good job for them or make best use of your skills” ⁴‍

Anya Gopfert, junior doctor and clinical fellow at the Health Foundation

So how can technology help?

Our daily lives are surrounded by technology that saves us time (my weekly family shop is now done in approximately 5 minutes while munching toast), helps us to make better decisions (finding cheaper deals with comparison websites) and increases enjoyment (on demand entertainment). It’s not surprising then that our expectations for technology in work are correspondingly higher. What we value in a job is also changing even before the accelerant provided by the pandemic. The 2017 Good Work review of modern working practices⁴ found that people want meaningful work where they have autonomy, feel their work makes a contribution, and feel listened to. Views echoed by the excellent Courage for Compassion report by the King’s Fund.⁵

“The system is part of our team… It’s our6th team member of staff on the night shift…it cannot do the hands-on care, butit can give you more time [for the hands-on care.]”

Linda Fitzpatrick, Ward Manager, Stanley Ward, Coventry and Warwickshire Partnership NHS Trust.”

As part of our learning at Oxehealth, we track the impact the technology is having through surveys and quantitative studies. Our studies provide fantastic insight into how staff are using technology to support them in reducing incidents and improving patient care and experience.

Serious incidents (SI) can have a significant psychological impact on staff. The Healthcare Safety Investigation Branch National Learning report noted that at an organisational level, SIs can result in increased levels of sickness, increased turnover of staff and reduced morale, more conservative management of patients and decreased discharges⁶

But we are also supplementing this by asking staff how this is impacting their experience at work.  Does it help them feel safe? Do they feel that they are able to do their job better? Do they feel they have more time to focus on what is important?  And increasingly we are going to be looking at how our technology can support teamwork (through transparent, real-time information), learning, autonomy and upskilling so staff can have a really good day at work.

Time to ask for a new KPI for technology investment?

I’ve written dozens of business cases for health-tech investment and the rationale is invariably based on:

1. Improving quality of care
2. Improving patient experience
3. Return on investment

You can’t disagree with these, but given the current staff pressures not to mention the clear link between staff and patient experience, isn’t it time we also asked how technology will improve staff experience?

“Staff wellbeing is an antecedent, not a consequence, of patient care performance. Thus seeking systematically to enhance staff wellbeing is not only important in its own right but also for the quality of patient experiences”.

Professor Jill Maben, Lead Researcher and Director of the National Nursing Research Unit at King’s College, London.

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Karen West

Head of Transformation for Mental Health Oxehealth

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