30 June 2023
The Health and Social Care Quality Improvement (HSCQI) Timely Access to Safe Care (TASC) programme has identified three project areas now going forward to scale and spread regionally. The HSCQI TASC programme involves the HSC Trusts engaging in quality improvement (QI) projects to improve timely access to safe care.
At the outset of this work, Trusts identified twenty-one QI projects to participate in Stage 1 of TASC under 6 workstreams, agreed by the HSCQI Leadership Alliance. The six workstreams were social care, scheduled inpatients, scheduled outpatients, unscheduled care, learning/intellectual disability and mental health. The TASC programme was designed, based on available evidence and a lengthy series of engagement events with key stakeholders, as a 2-stage model. Stage 1, which commenced in November 2022 and ended with a recent celebration event, involved local testing of QI projects – using recognised QI methodology, data and evidence and the sharing of learning on a regional basis through a collaboration-based approach
Three project areas have been selected as being in the readiest for system-wide scale and spread at this time and selected to progress, in the first instance, to TASC stage 2:
- Social care: Unallocated Cases in Children’s Services
- Mental Health: Improving Access to Adult Psychological Services
- Scheduled Outpatients: Improving Access to Physiotherapy and Occupational Therapy Services
Stage 2, which will run from September 2023 until June 2024, will be the scale and spread stage, where a number of projects will be supported to scale improvement across the region. Trusts have been working at pace to identify how they can adopt the identified projects and take on the learning in their own settings.
Pictured below the TASC Programme participants and ScIL graduates
Speaking at the TASC event to celebrate the valuable work undertaken across HSC on the programme, Dr Aideen Keaney, Director HSCQI, commented:
‘The HSCQI improving Timely Access to Safe Care (TASC) Regional Scale and Spread Programme has demonstrated the power of connecting as a system. TASC has given frontline teams an opportunity to share learning and to co-design a pathway to support the scale and spread of evidence-based improvement at pace. The commitment of local teams, along with executive sponsorship support, has been key to establishing the programme. The collective on-going dedication of these teams to seek ways to improve the quality of care provided for patients, service users and carers has been the driving force of this programme. It is great to see how the TASC programme has enabled all of us to connect as a Health and Social Care Quality Improvement Network and as a Health and Social Care System in order to share learning focused on improving access to safe care.’
If you would like to find out more about the HSCQI TASC Programme, please contact Clifford Mitchell, Senior Regional Improvement Advisor on clifford.mitchell@hscni.net
Keep up to date with HSCQI News on Twitter @HSCQI or favourite the HSCQI website hscqi.hscni.net.