Probrand Pursues Excellence in Healthcare
with Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust

Customer

With over 4,000 employees, Birmingham and Solihull Mental Health NHS Foundation Trust (BSMHFT) is one of the largest in the country, serving over a million people spread across 172 square miles. It is also a Global Digital Exemplar (GDE) trust, setting the pace in using technology to improve healthcare delivery. It has a duty to inspire and guide other trusts in their own innovation.

Challenge

The NHS has tasked the Trust with digitising inpatient monitoring in a project that will serve as a reference for other NHS Trusts.

The Trust had historically monitored inpatients manually using paper-based documents. The Trust’s digital system, developed in-house, prompts healthcare staff to check on patients and enter their status into mobile devices.

Choosing those mobile devices takes careful consideration. As a mental health trust, its service users present with significantly different needs to Acute and Community Trusts.

“Our wards are different to clinical wards in an acute trust,” explains the Trust’s Head of Procurement Linda McManus, adding that products must meet rigorous standards to prevent service users harming themselves. “It’s about recognising the different requirements of the mental health and ensuring that the product is appropriate.”

Solution

Probrand trialled 96 Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 devices on the Trust’s wards beginning in November 2017. After some breakages, it realised that it needed a more robust device and found the device’s rugged sibling, the Tab Active 2.

The Trust moved the existing Tab 2 devices into other administrative areas and instead used the new units on the ward, ordering 125 Tab Active 2 devices in March 2018. It was so impressed that it purchased 450 devices in total during the following year.

Benefits

Linda explains “The big win was more efficient reporting on patient status, which has a direct effect on patient care. With a paper-based system, a nurse who missed an observation may not pick this up until the next set were due. This could mean missing when a drug regime isn’t working as effectively as anticipated.

“With the Samsung devices, people are electronically able to run reports to make sure they’ve completed all service users’ observations.”

“Another significant benefit for the Samsung project was a reduction in paper,” explains Linda. By using digital devices, the Trust eliminated paper-based reporting on its wards, instead moving everything to a digital system.

Linda was impressed with Probrand’s professionalism in sourcing and supplying the products that it prompted her to contact Probrand for support with a sensitive procurement problem.