Self-care and wellbeing and being able to have the tools to manage it better is getting more and more important in workplaces, and health and social care are no different.
With the events of recent years, the impact of the pandemic, strikes, and now the cost-of-living crisis, promoting wellbeing in health and social care has never been so important not just for individuals but for support workers, carers, local authorities, and care providers too.
It is vital to be able to promote wellbeing in health and social care to avoid and improve outcomes. Having support workers and carers with bad mental health and wellbeing can increase the likelihood of errors which in turn can impact the quality of care delivered.
But what is the definition of wellbeing in health and social care, why is it important, and what can cause both an end-user’s wellbeing as well as a support worker’s wellbeing to decline?
At the Access Group, we put the individual at the heart of everything we do. We know the challenges facing the health and social care market and how important it is to ensure support workers and carers have a good work-life balance to ensure end-users get the care support they at the highest quality possible.
This article will review what wellbeing is in health and social care, what can cause it to decline, as well as ways to promote it and how technology can help implement better strategies so challenges can be overcome without leading to longer waiting times and discharge delays, burnout in social care, and ultimately people leaving the profession altogether.
Healthcare CRM refers to customer relationship management in healthcare. Maintaining good relationships with patients and clients across the health and care spectrum is important to help effect the change needed to ensure recovery or wellbeing in general, and to preserve business operations to support healthcare operations.
This makes it a little tricky for software solutions: handling both the patient side and the business side of care operations are two very different requirements. It may even be that you need two interoperable solutions to handle each side; a health CRM and an EHR solution.
Software solutions are the best way to handle the management process without burdening staff with undue amounts of administrative work, but it’s our belief that many organisations aren’t able to differentiate between healthcare CRM and electronic health records (EHR) and to decide which they need. This is why we have an official guide about Why Electronic Patient Record (EPR) systems aren’t just for hospitals, to help private or voluntary care organisations understand the market.
In this article we will explore that market and guide you towards the best solution for you – whether that’s a healthcare CRM or an EPR. We’ll explore what CRMs do, covering the definition of CRM in healthcare, before moving on to patient relationships, the benefits of CRM, and the specific impact CRM can have on mental health care. We will then conclude with the solutions themselves; what do they do, how do they differ, can they integrate with your existing software, and most importantly which will allow you to make better decisions for staff and patients, so that you can deliver better service.
What is CRM in healthcare?
To pinpoint the advantages or disadvantages of electronic medical records and the software solutions that enable them, you first need to know what they are.
Electronic medical records are digitised versions of patient notes and personal details, with information such as demographics and psychographics. These records are managed through electronic patient records (EPR) software – sometimes called electronic health records (EHR).
You might be wondering why electronic medical records are such a talking point. The NHS is pushing for trusts across England – and leaning on devolved NHS partners elsewhere in the UK – to onboard these solutions in all hospitals as a way to optimise the administrative and data processes involved in managing patient care.
In this article we will explore the impact of electronic records on the quality of care and any supporting evidence, before discussing the benefits and the challenges that face healthcare professionals and their organisations.
Do electronic medical records improve quality of care?
To understand patient engagement strategies, we first must define what a patient engagement strategy is – or at least what its purpose is.
A patient engagement strategy is a plan of action to further improve patient engagement with the healthcare provider and their own care. Research has shown that better patient engagement leads to better care outcomes, and this is the main purpose of any healthcare provider – to provide the best care possible.
Patient activation (how proactive a patient is with their own care) is generally fairly low, but the traditional doctor-patient relationship is being altered slowly but surely. Now the process is much more collaborative and a conversation, with younger generations especially – thanks to modern technology – taking a greater interest in their healthcare.
More software applications are being developed too; to avoid inequality in care by being easy to learn and easy to use by those who may lack the digital literacy of the younger generations, thus being inclusive and giving everyone the opportunity to be part of their care journey and to feel more involved.
In this article we will be exploring the patient experience, general strategies for engagement, how these tactics can be used within healthcare specifically, and how healthcare organisations can build upon this to develop a framework for future rollouts of patient engagement strategies.
Equality and diversity in health and social care is incredibly important, but often overlooked. It should be an integral part of your service rather than a bonus or benefit.
Equality means that everyone in the care setting is given equal opportunities, regardless of their background, abilities or lifestyle.
On the other hand, diversity means that differences between people should be appreciated and people’s beliefs, cultures and values should be treated with respect.
AI in healthcare is about using artificial intelligence to enable medical professionals to provide better help to patients. Artificial Intelligence (AI) is when computers perform tasks that would normally require human skills or judgement. The computer is simulating or copying human behaviour to achieve the same results.
AI can speed up tasks that have traditionally been slow and time-consuming, automating what previously was manual admin work, or identifying patterns and trends in things such as scans or patient notes to support more proactive care and often catching illnesses earlier.
Scientific advances have provided us with wearable technology for autism, helping clinicians to recognise that there’s more to be gained by personalising care and understanding that conditions or ailments may have unique elements from person to person. The same can be said for people with Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD).
Thanks to better medical knowledge, autism is far more identifiable amongst children, meaning better support through the developmental years. There’s still much to be done though, and the biggest research breakthroughs are so recent that many millennials – people aged 30s to early 40s – are finally being diagnosed as autistic or with other neurodivergent conditions. This will provide answers they have been longing for, but also will open them up to the reality that perhaps they need more support in managing day-to-day life and their wellbeing. This is where wearable devices come in as assistive technology.
In this article we will define autism and touch upon some of the surrounding context, before exploring wearable technology for autism. We will showcase autism wearables and provide a ‘best of’ list of impactful technologies or gadgets; all in the hope of helping improve the quality of life for someone with ASD or assisting loved ones and carers working with autistic individuals.
What is Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD)?
Even before Covid, 75% of nurses surveyed in 2005 identified nurse shortages led to more pressure, longer hours, decreased patient satisfaction, and for many, leaving the profession. Here is a guide on how staffing effects patient outcomes and job satisfaction to ensure the best management of your staff and the best patient outcomes.
The NHS Long Term Plan is a 10-year strategy to make sure that the NHS keeps ‘levelling up’ and maintains or improves its care output for the UK population. As part of this plan we are seeing targets set for social prescribing; an approach to care that can fit in to the NHS Long Term Plan and help the NHS to better engage with patients.
By offering a community-level support system for day-to-day life, social prescribing can support the NHS by preventing injury, illness, or the deterioration of conditions in many cases. This isn’t a new approach, but holistic care often has to take a backseat, and that needs to change if the NHS is to be the best modern healthcare service in the world.
In this article we’ll detail the specifics of what social prescribing and what the NHS Long Term Plan are, as well as their importance due to the benefits to be had by the UK public. We will also highlight how digitisation comes into play, and how modern software solutions are now very capable of enabling social prescribing to support the NHS – including our very own Access Elemental social prescribing solution.
The NHS Digital Capability Framework (DCF) is a list of requirements specifying what acute, community, mental health, ambulance and maternity providers must do in order to match the NHS England digital strategy and achieve digital maturity.
The NHS Minimum Digital Foundations are now termed the Digital Capabilities Framework and are still broadly in line with the HIMSS EMRAM level 5 framework. The requirement for every Trust to have an EPR as a pre-requisite and each EPR to meet the standards set out in the Core capabilities to facilitate the NHS to meet the Core digital capability for the Government’s levelling up agenda.
Achieving the Digital Capability Framework is a necessary step in the evolution of NHS Trusts and Integrated Care Boards (ICBs). Minimum digital foundations are the fundamental pieces of the jigsaw. NHS England’s goal is to build on the technology pre-requisites and expand to become a nationally connected healthcare ecosystem. The goal is ensuring patient engagement is at the heart of care provision, irrespective of the systems in use by that Trust. The big challenge though is that there are over 100 Core requirements within the DCF, and success means demonstrating these capabilities within each organisation.
In this article we will discuss Frontline Digitisation further, what the Digital Capabilities Framework looks like, and the benefits and challenges of digitisation. We’ll also look at the technology available to support the NHS in their mission to modernise care delivery, with specific focus on the crucial role electronic patient records (EPRs) have to play.
