The HPB coordinator and clinicians at a London Trust decided that further digital support was required in order to improve the performance of the MDT and to reduce administrative overheads.  

An internal review identified inconsistencies with incoming referrals which were resulting in delays to decision-making and additional administration; to the detriment of patient care. 

The key issues were: 

• referrals being received via multiple channels preventing proper control and governance 
• data content of the referrals varied by channel and referrer with some ‘mandatory’ fields not always present 
• where data was missing, incomplete or unclear the MDT coordinator was spending significant time requesting a corrected resubmission of the referral 

The HPP department decided that they wished to standardise all incoming referrals to the MDT coordinator via a new referral web application. IGspectrum were approached and were provided with details of the scope and basic requirements. A new incoming referrals service was then quickly configured as a secure web application and made available from the Trust’s website with instructions to all referrers that this was the sole means of submission. 

Key features of the new HBP MDT service were: 

• standardised referral form with mandatory fields and extensive use of drop-downs ensuring consistency of the data received 
• ability to request further data from the referrer via the original referral with a chronology of the interactions maintained 
• comprehensive dashboard with sort and filter functions providing total control and governance 
• alerting and tracking capabilities, via the dashboard, of all new and outstanding submissions 

The anticipated benefits of the new service were quickly realised post-deployment of the new service with: 

• MDTs now  entirely managed within the portal  
• improved quality of referrals ensuring that MDT requirements are satisfied  
• substantial reduction in rolled-over MDT requests 
• increase in the rate of successful MDT reviews by providing all the necessary information for decision making 

For more information on how this service can assist your MDT please contact us and we will assist you in initiating discussions with the sponsoring Trust.