This month we talked to Alex Pegg, a project officer working with the Greater Manchester ICB, to discuss how the ICB
collectively approached PRSAS accreditation. The ICB funded 13 services to join
the accreditation pathway and have provided a fantastic level of support for their
participating services, encouraging shared learning and collaborative meetings between
colleagues.
You
were one of the first to fund services as a group - can you tell us about how
Greater Manchester as an ICB decided to fund services for accreditation?
Greater Manchester and Eastern Cheshire Strategic Clinical
Networks identified accreditation as being a key factor to help PR services
make improvements and reduce variation across Greater Manchester. We funded
accreditation to ensure all services started the journey together at the same
time.
Having services enter the pathway at the same time must
have been helpful, as each team would be in similar stages of self-improvement
and preparation. Was
there any difficulty in getting services on board with the process of
accreditation at the beginning?
No, we had buy-in from all 13 PR services across GM & EC
from the beginning of the process. Some areas had concerns over the time needed
and workload involved in the lead up to the onsite assessment, but we outlined
the support available from the collaborative and the PRSAS office, so services
were happy to participate.
In
your collaborative approach at the Greater Manchester ICB, how do you share
learning across teams?
We created a PR workspace on the Future NHS site which
includes a section on accreditation which holds examples of documents our teams
have used such as SOPs, surveys, mission statements etc. It also includes a
forum where teams ask questions and share best practice.
In addition to the site, we also share learning at the
collaborative meetings with accreditation standards being a regular topic.
How
do you think the ICB collaborative approach to PRSAS accreditation benefits
services?
The collaborative approach helps a lot. We started the
collaboration in May 2021 with the aim of achieving the objectives of the NHS
Long Term Plan: improving services, and achieving PRSAS accreditation. We have
monthly meetings which are attended by all 13 PR teams and associated
commissioners. It has enabled us to make lots of progress in developing and
enhancing services, such as creating a PR website which has improved the number and quality of referrals. Another example is our
new patient education booklet used by patients during and after their classes.
The booklet covers many areas including exercise, medication, diet and planning
for the future.
The collaborative meetings are the ideal platform to discuss
accreditation and share best practice - Cynthia Yim (PRSAS programme manager)
has attended previously to provide advice and guidance on the PRSAS standards.
We have 2 services that have successfully completed
accreditation firstly Trafford and then Enhanced Respiratory Service (ERS) –
Rochdale Infirmary. The leads from these services have made presentations to
the group on how they achieved accreditation and have been on hand to help
other teams.
We’ve also recently heard from the Trafford PR service when
they presented at our recent beginner’s training session. Chris Dalton
(specialist respiratory physiotherapist) - the lead at ERS Rochdale - will be
talking about his PRSAS experience in the upcoming advanced session on 5 March.
You can read more about our training sessions here.
How
do you communicate/keep track of the accreditation journey for different
services?
At the start of the process, we had meetings with the PR
team leaders to go through the requirements of each accreditation standard and
they completed a GAP analysis for their service. PR services have also attended
tailored individual support meetings with our clinical lead Sue Mason and
Cynthia Yim from PRSAS to go through their accreditation plans and assess how
they were progressing to meeting the standards. We continue to keep track of
progress at our collaborative meetings.
*To complete a RAG rating/GAP analysis of your service,
you can use our template. This is located on your assessment dashboard >
templates and support > guidance and other resources.
What
have been the highlights?
One major highlight has been the way that our services have
worked together. There has been a lot of support and help provided between the
13 PR teams in sharing information, experiences, and best practice. Other
highlights being when two of our services successfully gained accreditation in
2023.
Congratulations from the PRSAS team to Trafford Pulmonary
Rehabilitation Service and Enhanced Respiratory Service (ERS) – Rochdale
Infirmary for achieving accreditation last year!
Thank you to Alex for sharing his accreditation
experience while working with the Greater Manchester ICB, and showcasing how a
collaborative approach can benefit services going through the accreditation
process.
If you would like to
know more about the accreditation pathway and how to get started, click here. To get in touch with
the PRSAS office, email pulmrehab@rcp.ac.uk