Harrogate and District NHS Foundation Trust
In October 2017, Harrogate and District NHS Foundation Trust (HDFT) was seeking to partner with an experienced managed service provider to support the development of their temporary staffing model for medical staff. The Trust appointed Medacs Healthcare as Master Vendor via a competitive process for the supply of framework-approved medical locums.
HDFT is an integrated acute and community Trust with a main hospital site situated in Harrogate. Due to the proximity of other larger hospital sites, the Trust operates in a competitive environment for temporary medical staff. Unfilled shifts carry significant risk, requiring the Trust to implement other contingency plans to maintain levels of high-quality care.
HDFT needed to increase their fill rates to mitigate these risks, and as a result, the Trust was compelled at times to turn to high-cost agencies to provide the locum cover they needed, which was driving up costs and risking compliance.
The Trust urgently needed to increase fill rates, improve compliance in line with framework specifications and reduce temporary staffing costs in line with NHS Improvement targets. To better control their temporary staffing challenges, they also needed intelligent reporting to help them understand the evidence-based causes of demand and proactively implement change.
As Master Vendors, Medacs Healthcare implemented new systems and processes to provide increased fill rates and better visibility of temporary staffing spend. By doing so, the trust benefited from a more
consistent supply of high-quality, compliant workers, improved controls and enhanced workforce intelligence to enable them to make proactive decisions.
With detailed management information, HDFT can now see spend and fill by department, enabling better rate controls and lead times for unscheduled care with more advanced planning. The approach to compliance has also been dramatically improved with new authorisation procedures and a full audit trail, with additional support provided by Medacs Healthcare’s independent Clinical Governance team.
Partnering with Medacs Healthcare has helped the trust to significantly reduce temporary staffing costs, maintain high fill rates and safeguard compliance standards.