Nursing | Meridian Productivity

Nurse staffing constitutes a paramount consideration, with profound implications for healthcare organisations. Our role involves assisting these entities in evaluating the alignment of their workforce—ensuring that the right personnel are deployed effectively and efficiently.

Through meticulous scrutiny of skill mix, shift patterns, off-duty schedules, and operational procedures, Meridian empowers organisations to harmonise their workforce composition. This pursuit strikes an equilibrium that not only optimises value for money but also ensures the delivery of top-tier care, maximising positive patient outcomes.

Case Studies: Nursing

Community Nursing

Accurate operational performance information was not available to the Management Board on a weekly/monthly basis, therefore evaluation of where and how to proactively improve utilisation and reference costs was not being carried out.

Short Term Conditions & Long Term Conditions Community Nursing Services

The directorate has been keen to standardise working practices across the East and West localities and ensure best practice is shared.

Community Nursing Services

The Executive team invited Meridian to assist them in understanding how much resource they needed to adequately deliver services whilst remaining within their existing budget and making financial savings where possible.

Community Services Improvement Programme

Meridian conducted an analysis of the services to highlight areas which with greater control would improve the way the teams were managed, enabling a more efficient service, improving the quality of care and value for money.

Long Term Conditions Community Nursing Services

The study identified that the current management system lacked control over forecasting, planning and assignment of activity and that targets, expectations and the allocation processes, were inconsistent across the clusters and within teams.

School Nursing Service Redesign Programme

The analysis revealed that the service provided to each school and by each nurse varied widely. There was no formal expectation of required deliverables and a need to strengthen their negotiation position in the approach to the end of their contract.

School Health Service Programme Redesign

The study identified that 24% of nurse time was spent in contact with children/parents, Face to Face (FTF) the majority of nurses’ days were spent in lengthy case conferences, as well as safeguarding and care planning meetings.

Specialist Nursing, Community Nursing & Community Therapy (IAPT)

The analysis identified an opportunity to generate savings (£200k) in Specialist Nursing Service by increasing productivity by 15% and the need to increase productivity in the IAPT Service to meet the 15% Access target.

References

"Within Specialist Community Nursing, out of a clinical staffing budget of £1.5m, the team was able to identify up to 400 hours per week of additional non-clinical hours, equating to savings of up to £431,000"

"While we are currently finalising the size of the teams, we have identified and opportunity of around £2.3m worth of savings and cashed £387l within the duration of the programme, meaning that the project paid for itself before it ended."

"It has put us in a far stronger position in terms of future contract bidding processes. The schools will not get a much better nurse contact (82% of nurses' time will now be spent based on school premises conducting school related duties)."

"Meridian put forward proposals to both boards in order to modernise working patterns and make the most effective use of resources."

"The programme has allowed us to make huge strides in terms of better understanding and maximising our capacity, as well as enabling us to break some of the historic paradigms and ways of working."