National award for Singleton Hospital
27 November 2009
An initiative that has reduced the time people need to spend in Singleton Hospital and the number of re-admissions after discharge has won a prestigious national award recognising outstanding achievement in healthcare performance.
The No Barriers multidisciplinary discharge planning initiative was a major winner in the Australian Council on Healthcare Standards annual Quality Improvement Awards, announced in Sydney on Thursday night. [NB: 26 November 2009]
The initiative is a collaboration between Hunter New England Health and a range of community-based agencies and care providers in Singleton, including nursing homes, aged care hostels, Home and Community Care and other non-government organisations.
Singleton Health Service Manager Wendy Mason-Jones said the award was recognition of the hard work and ongoing efforts by Health Service staff to improve patients’ experience, particularly older patients and those who had ongoing and sometimes more complex care requirements after they left hospital.
“We are thrilled to have won the award – these are very prestigious, national awards,” Ms Mason-Jones said.
“Singleton is a great community and I think this is also recognition of the wonderful community partnerships that have been formed through this project.
“The name says it all, ‘No Barriers’. It really takes a holistic approach and gets everyone together in a round table to try to make sure there are no barriers to our patients’ ongoing care and that it can be provided where and when it is needed.”
In many ways the project has exceeded expectations. Since the No Barriers project began, the average length of stay for patients at Singleton Hospital has almost halved, decreasing from 4.5 days to 2.5 days, a much better improvement than the 25 per cent target set initially. Similarly, readmission rates have also reduced markedly.
Lower Hunter Cluster General Manager Yvonne Patricks congratulated all involved in the project.
“It is a wonderful example of what community partnerships can achieve and what collaboration is all about,” Ms Patricks said.
“This national award is a significant achievement for the Singleton Health Service staff and the other partners who have made a valuable contribution to improving the quality of care in their local community.”
The Australian Council on Healthcare Standards is Australia’s leading health care accreditation agency. Its Quality Improvement Awards recognise outstanding achievement in three major categories covering clinical care-patient safety, non-clinical service delivery and health care performance, the category won by Singleton Health Service. Other winners this year were from Victoria and Liverpool Hospital in Sydney.
Contact: Frances Holz
Phone: 4939 2216