Bristol uses IT to underpin foundation status

University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust has chosen CACI’s InView data warehouse and reporting system to underpin its transition to foundation status.

The new system will allow the trust to improve data quality and support 18 week pathways, Payment by Results, performance monitoring and other information demands.

InView is a web-based solution that utilises Microsoft SQL Server and BusinessObjects XI technology platform. At Bristol, it will integrate data from eight trust locations and ten clinical and management and management data sources. Users will be able to view high level dashboards or detailed reports and analyses.

The trust, which employs more than 7,000 staff, said it needed to improve the functionality of its data warehouse and enhance the quality of its reporting as a result of gaining foundation trust status on 1 June this year.

“Since becoming a foundation trust we have had greater freedom to develop our business choices to implement strategy and management,” Chris Green, the trust’s information and performance systems manager, told E-Health-Insider.

“Being able to serve our patients and the wider healthcare community effectively makes data quality a high priority.”

InView will go live at the trust on 1 April next year. The trust expects full implementation to take around six months. Green said that implementing the software is a “good strategic move.”

“Finding a management information system that could bring data together in a web-reporting environment was key in our bid to improve the trust informatics service,” he said. “With InView we will gain a complete picture of trust activity.

“Because the software is web-based, reports will be easier to view. Before we used spreadsheets, but now staff can view reports online, which speeds up the process.”

The trust trialled two different solutions but decided to go for CACI’s system because both North Devon Healthcare NHS trust and South Devon Healthcare NHS trust had seen good results from it.

CACI provides business information systems to public and private sector clients across Europe, but InView has been designed specifically to support management in the NHS.

Links

University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust

CACI