Background
Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust is one of the largest acute NHS trusts in England, providing regional specialist care for over 5 million people. The Paediatric Surgery Service at Leeds Children’s Hospital offers a range of procedures for children in Leeds and across Yorkshire and is a world leader in Paediatric Robotic surgery.
Medacs began working with Leeds Teaching Hospitals in June 2022, supporting their Children’s Hospital to increase their in-week surgical capacity and activity in line with national targets. Medacs was selected as the Trust’s insourcing partner following a competitive tender process via a national insourcing framework. Medacs’ bid scored highly due to the positive feedback received for the delivery of a Paediatrics insourcing service for a similar Trust, with complex procedures successfully and safely managed alongside more routine planned care operations.
The solution
The Trust selected Medacs ‘allied’ workforce model, choosing to predominantly use their own surgeons and theatre nursing staff, with extra support from a team supplied by Medacs, including Anaesthetists, ODPs, scrub nurses and theatre support workers.
All extra staff were experienced in paediatric surgery, with other relevant specialty-based skills and regular availability. With ‘block’ rostering for recurring shift patterns, these extra staff were quickly embedded as regular, familiar and trusted extra members of existing theatre teams.
Communication
The Trust commended Medacs for quickly resolving initial teething issues with proactive hands-on support from senior staff, who spent time onsite directly gathering feedback from teams and ‘walking the patient pathway’.
Meetings were scheduled twice weekly, and strong relationships were successfully built with operational and clinical leads with an open and honest approach, ensuring the Trust were given plenty of notice when there was any risk to fill.
Responsiveness
During train strikes, Medacs arranged taxis and overnight stays in hotels to ensure staff could attend and no procedures would be cancelled for young patients.
On one occasion, a replacement staff member was drafted in with just a few hours advance notice, booking late on Sunday night for a Monday morning session.
Continuity and Quality of Staff
Medacs consistently ensured a regular team was available to support surgical sessions, all highly familiar with local staff and their preferred working methods. With all extra staff and their skills ‘known’, the Trust was able to plan services more flexibly across different theatres and specialties. 99% of planned lists went ahead and feedback on the quality of the staff supplied was highly positive.
Deputy General Manager – Theatres and Anaesthesia:
“A reliable service. The continuity of the team gave us the confidence to list more flexibly and redeploy people where they were most needed. With Medacs’ support, our Paediatric waiting list is now under control, positively impacting many children and their families”
