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NHS mental health trusts are going paperless and mobile to deliver services whenever and wherever they’re needed
Jonathan Mills from Evoluu describes how a scalable, configurable and portable mental health solution can be the foundation of a paper-free approach to ensuring quality of care on a wide-spread frontline.
The need to modernise and develop mental health services to become a more outcomes driven and evidence-based environment is essential if services are to be fit-for-purpose. However, mental health has a unique set of complexities due to the legal issues which surround vulnerable patients and the need to provide services out in the community.
Because of this specialist nature, it’s even more unrealistic for mental health professionals to be constrained to paper or even desktop-based tools. Mental health is a speciality that needs to be delivered in a variety of locations, from communities to prisons, with access to a wide range of data, and to be available, captured and monitored in real-time.
Escalating demands on NHS mental health services at a time of increased funding constraints has drastically heightened the burden on health services across the country - directly increasing the demand for solutions which can improve clinical efficiency and reduce costs simultaneously. Silverlink has put over 15 years of experience into the development of their specialist Mental Health solutions, including psychiatry with the recent addition of the CapturePsychiatry mental health liaison module. These solutions cater to underpinning the whole spectrum of mental health and psychiatric care.
Silverlink’s collaboration with clinicians and users at trusts such as Lincolnshire Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (LPFT), means their solution is the only one in today’s market which has been specially developed to support mental health as it’s meant to be delivered: providing end-to-end support for the whole administrative cycle to create efficient and integrated workflows. “Silverlink offers a fully integrated Mental Health system that ticks all the boxes,” said Carolyn Holmes, Clinical Systems Developer Manager at LPFT.
Keeping in step with regulatory adherence
Mental health systems not only need to comply with NHS regulations and the current Mental Health Act, but also need to ensure that the complete range of assessments and information is available in all settings where mental health services are being delivered to ensure that crucial information doesn’t slip through the cracks.
Silverlink’s Mental Health solution has been recognised as the best solution in the market in terms of complying with the Mental Health Act’s requirements. The solution fully supports all the rules and provisions set out in the Act to enable mental health administrators to effectively manage patients in a multitude of settings.
The solution supports all aspects of the Electronic Care Approach Program Module (eCPAm); Payment by Results; Clinical Clustering; and Mental Health Datasets, including MHLDDS and CDS. The solution also offers a full set of assessments for Improving Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) and Child and Adolescent IAPT datasets (CAMHS-IAPT).
Mobile capabilities for a paperless foundation
In the push for the NHS to go paperless by 2018, it’s key for facilities to move their paper-based documentation into an electronic format as soon as possible. Silverlink’s Mental Health solution has more than 100 specialist assessments available and allows the assessments to be carried out via a desktop or mobile/tablet app, and soon via a web browser too.
According to LPFT, Silverlink is helping them to realise their strategic objective of becoming paper-free by “providing a solution that is making our goal a reality.” The solution is used to capture patient and clinical information from across all 80+ LPFT operational locations, to a central system that facilitates in the administration of the Trust’s patients.
To cater for the specific needs of remote mental health clinics and staff which provide community-based care, Silverlink’s mobile applications, which include mental health as well as acute and community PAS, offer offline-working functionality to allow users to carry out electronic assessments and patient treatment plans on the mobile device even when in locations with poor connectivity or infrastructure; doing away with any reliance on paper and the inconvenience of duplicate working. The data is then automatically synchronised with the organisation’s central Mental Health database once a connection is re-established.
Information can also be fed in and read remotely creating a more fluid and enhanced working environment. A direct feed from the database allows real-time reporting and dashboards for clinicians or service managers. These paperless assessments combined with powerful informatics tools are enabling mental health facilities to more effectively identify and evaluate the treatment outcomes to ensure faster, safer and more cost-effective patient-centred care.
Structured development
Silverlink’s Mental Health solution is being continuously developed in collaboration with frontline users to make it a smarter user experience and, as a result, is becoming a resource that is indispensable to mental health facilities in the paperless age.
W: www.silverlinksoftware.com