London North West ‘hospital at home’ team saves over 20,000 bed days in one year with Infinity
A ‘hospital at home’ team at London North West University Healthcare NHS Trust has helped save over 20,000 bed days in one year by using a care coordination platform by Infinity Health. The short-term assessment, rehabilitation and reablement service (STARRS) staff use Infinity to manage and coordinate their workload and communicate with each other, from anywhere.
The STARRS team provide acute-level care in patients’ homes, enabling early discharge from hospital and reducing hospital admissions and readmissions. Replacing paper lists, telephone calls and face-to-face handovers with the Infinity platform has increased capacity in the team over the past three years to support more patients.
In January 2020, when Infinity was embedded, there was an average of seven patients per staff member, while in January 2023 this rose to 10 patients per staff member. This 43% increase in patients, together with a 62% increase in tasks per staff member, means that a 27-55% capacity increase predicted at the start of the project has been realised.
STARRS staff provide care for patients that on average would have stayed an extra 5.6 days in hospital. Increasing capacity allowed the team to care for 3732 patients in their own homes in 2022, saving the hospital 20,899 in additional bed days.
Providing patients with treatment at home reduces the length of stay in hospital, prevents readmission, reduces hospital-acquired infections, and helps patients to recover quickly. It also allows beds to be available for patients who need them the most, reducing waiting times and the risks associated with delayed admissions.
Previously, the service was using outdated care coordination tools that were inefficient, involved duplication, and wasted time on phone calls and returning to base to relay visit results. Infinity has allowed the multidisciplinary team to create, assign and track tasks in real-time, on any modern device. Staff can securely log in and see critical patient information when they need it and they have visibility of which team member is doing what task for which patient and the status of the task. No tasks are missed, improving clinical safety for patients.
“Infinity has helped us to manage our caseload safely and efficiently and support more patients to recover in their own home. This in turn helps to free up beds for patients who need to receive treatment in hospital. It also helps us to help staff so they can concentrate on their clinical role and protect their own health and wellbeing.”
- Devaneson Robert
Service Manager - STARRS, London North West University Healthcare NHS Trust
“Infinity works well for our team. You can download the app on your phone, and you have all your tasks and patient information in front of you. We can save time and prioritise in providing safe and effective care to patients. We couldn’t have done this before.”
- Ambika Gurung
Senior Nurse STARRS (Early Supported Discharge), Northwick Park Hospital
“At the start of this project we estimated an increase in capacity to see more patients, but opening up 20,000 bed days in one year makes a significant impact on overstretched hospitals. We want to provide all NHS staff with the right tools to make their workload more manageable, save time, and reduce stress.”
- Elliott Engers
CEO, Infinity Health
More information
Read the full case study here
Healthcare professionals use Infinity to manage their workload and coordinate care in and across multidisciplinary teams. Infinity gives them time back every day to make patient care safer and more efficient.