Passing Microsoft Excel Advanced!

16^th October 2015- 30^th October 2015

Recently I have been working on a presentation for our CQUIN workshops that we hold each year with our providers. The workshops enable us to discuss with our providers potential CQUINs for the following year and generate innovative ideas whilst ensuring the CQUINs are realistic for the provider to achieve.

I was feeling adventurous when creating the presentation and used “Prezi” which is relatively new presentation software, instead of the traditional PowerPoint! I hadn't used Prezi before, but it was much more straightforward than I thought and I am very pleased with the outcome! It helps to create a unique and engaging presentation. I will definitely use Prezi in my final year at university when I do presentations in my seminars to tutors and colleagues.

I’ve continued working on the Performance section of the CCG website which is almost finished. I think it is much clearer and easier now for a member of the public to find out how our CCG monitors quality and be able to understand the array of measures used to do this. I’ve also been working a great deal on the Practice Nurse area on the CCG website along with Kate from the Communications team. The nurses in Eastern Cheshire will have access to information on PGDs, the training and education events they attend, policies and protocols and have a 'News' section. My website designing skills have definitely progressed!

I am very fortunate to have been given the opportunity to enhance my personal development skills whilst on my placement. This week I went on an Advanced Microsoft Excel course. It was an extremely beneficial course and I learnt a lot including: validation rules, formula precedents and dependents, error checking, watch windows, protection, complex functions, pivot tables/charts and macros. I am pleased to say I have passed this course! It will be of great use for my role at the CCG as I often create reports and use excel. It will also be of great use when I return to university and in future job roles.

Also this week, I created a commissioning intentions survey for the patients in Eastern Cheshire in order to hear their opinions on what they think should be commissioned. I will be working with the Communications and Engagement Team to promote and encourage patients to take the survey.

In addition to this, I joined a WebEx on Quality Improvement along with my manager Andrew. I was surprised to find that it covered concepts I learnt in one of my modules during my second year of university such as ideas from Deming and Ishikawa.  I wrote an essay for this module which talked in depth about Deming, Ishikawa and their influence on quality improvement. Therefore it was very interesting to see that theoretical studies such as this are applied to business on a daily basis and are adopted by members of staff in the NHS!

The Friends & Family Test!

 2^nd October 2015- 16^th October 2015

Over the past couple of  weeks, myself and a staff member from CVS Cheshire East have been working together to improve the Quality & Performance section on the CCG’s website, particularly our performance documents including CQUINs, Quality Premium, NHS Constitution and A&E data which we share with the public. I am in the process of ‘translating’ the complex NHS terminology so that the public can easily understand the documents should they want to. The visitor will be provided with a brief description of what each term means when they click on it and why and how we measure it.  I will be presenting back at our next Clinical Quality & Performance Meeting on our progress.

Additionally this week, Sally and I have met with a couple of our ophthalmology providers to finalize the contracts which is very exciting! I have been fortunate enough to view the whole process of contracting, starting from going out to tender for a contract to the commencement of the service delivery.

I have also prepared a report based on the Trust’s Friends & Family Test (FFT) performance. Patients across the country are asked when they leave hospital whether they would recommend the hospital's services to friends and family.This is a vital feedback tool for patients on their experience of the NHS services including: A&E, Inpatient, Outpatient, Maternity, Community, Mental Health and the GP Practices in Eastern Cheshire.  The results have been very positive for East Cheshire Trust!

In addition to this, I also completed a “Presentation Skills” course which definitely helped when I presented our commissioning intentions for 16/17 at our staff briefing meeting which is held monthly. I gave an update to all our staff members on the process we are following and where we are up to with it. 

Presenting our Commissioning Intentions!

21^st September 2015- 2^nd October 2015

Apologies for the lack of blog posts lately- I’m doing two weeks in one as I’ve been extremely busy and not had the chance to write up what I’ve been up to!

I am making progress with the Ophthalmology contracts; two are near completion! The contract manager Sally and I are are meeting with one of the providers next week so that we can ensure we have everything ready for the commencement of the contract and to go through the final documents that we need.

This week I have also compiled a report based on a multitude of data about the Trust’s performance on a range of areas such as Pneumonia, Heart Failure, Diabetes and COPD. It is an informative and visual report with graphs to send to the Trust in order for them to clearly see their current performance in these areas and their peer group position amongst other similar CCGs.

Last Friday I attended my first Health Voice meeting. HealthVoice is an independent, voluntary body that advises our CCG on the planning and buying of health services, helping ensure that the needs of patients, carers and the public are taken fully into account when decisions are made. It was an interesting and productive meeting with the patients sharing their opinions about the latest updates at the CCG. I have also been assisting the Communications and Engagement Team with a few tasks regarding Health Voice such as the Health Voice Pharmacy Letter Campaign. This is a campaign aiming to get more members of the public involved with HealthVoice. As the degree I am studying for at university is Business and Marketing, it is great to see how the CCG promotes itself and HealthVoice to the public.

Another project I am involved in is assisting Jacki Wilkes, the Associate Director of Commissioning, in developing our commissioning intentions for 2016/17.I have been collating all the proposed initial intentions from key members of staff at the CCG and we have met with patients to inform them of the process and listen to their thoughts. 

I then presented this at the Locality Meeting in Macclesfield. As mentioned in previous blogs, this is a meeting between around 50 GPs and Practice Managers in Eastern Cheshire and a few key members of the CCG in order to give updates on work streams. I presented our commissioning intentions process for 2016/17 at the meeting, explaining where we are currently up to and asked for everyone's thoughts on potential commissioning intentions based upon any gaps in their local area, any key areas for development in a hospital and a community setting and the benefit of the intention. We've received some great responses and I will be collating them next week in time for the next step of the process; to prioritise and shortlist the intentions!

In addition to this I have been learning about Terms Of References in meetings as I have had to create the Terms Of References for a new meeting to replace/merge the Finance & Activity meeting and the Service Quality Review meeting. It was useful to learn about the formality of meetings and the rules involved. 

Finalising the Outcome Based Commissioning process!

14th September 2015- 18th September 2015

This week at the CCG I have continued working on CQUINS (Commissioning for Quality and Innovation) for our mental health provider; CWP. I have been reporting to CWP our feedback for each CQUIN’s evidence that was submitted. I have definitely improved my medical knowledge working at the CCG- I’m grateful I took Biology at A-level as it has certainly helped! I am thoroughly enjoying working in the healthcare sector as it is such a dynamic environment and there is plenty to constantly learn about which I enjoy!

I have also been looking at potential quality standards, outcomes and CQUINs we can incorporate into the Ophthalmology contracts. These are designed to drive measurable quality improvements within the service.

As well as this, I've also been working on finalising the outcome based commissioning process with Amy; the other placement student at the CCG. We have designed a sample process of how a project lead would go about following an outcome based commissioning process starting from identifying the problems in the current system to deciding upon the outcomes and indicators (often the most ambiguous step), redesigning services and how to measure the outcomes' progress. It is a detailed process using examples and best practice. We are now putting together a project plan to proposed time scales. 

I am really enjoying this task as it requires in depth research as it is a relatively new approach with few other CCGs currently performing this way.  With increasing demographic pressures, rising expectations, a widening gap between demand and resources and outdated and over stretched delivery systems, this outcome based approach has the potential to reduce costs and improve the quality of services considerably. Therefore, by outlining a thorough, clear process will help to anticipate any problems when commissioning this way and be most effective. Amy and I are meeting with a few members of staff at the CCG next week to show the process we have come up with so far.

Also this week, I had a meeting with Brenda Smith, the director of Adult Social Care and Independent Living at Cheshire East Council. Brenda was very helpful in giving me an overview of her role in the council and her relationship to the CCG, specifically the Caring Together programme. It was very interesting to see the link and understand her vital roles in strategic and individual commissioning.

From contracts to website designing!

7th September 2015- 11th September 2015

I’ve been involved in a wide variety of projects this week at the CCG; some of which are listed below.

At the start of the week, along with my manager Andrew, I completed my Personal Development Review (PDR). All members of staff working for the NHS are required to complete a PDR every year in order to review their progress within the organization. I have noted my personal objectives I hope to achieve over the next twelve months, what I believe to be are my most important aims and tasks for the next year and my action plan for achieving these.

I have also been completing a few of the contacts for the Ophthalmology service; liaising with the Providers about the policies and documents we require and any they would like to be included in the contract.

On Wednesday I attended my first Clinical Quality and Performance Committee meeting. This meeting reviews all of the quality aspects of the local healthcare services that are being delivered. Dashboards are presented to highlight performance in terms of A&E attendance, FFT performance, and IAPT referrals. I understood most things that were discussed (which shows I am definitely making progress understanding the complex and diverse areas of the CCG!). 

On Thursday I attended a workshop in Middlewich along with my manager Andrew, the other placement student Amy and her manager Jane as they were giving presentations on Outcome Based Commissioning and Service Improvement to the lead practice nurses from Eastern and South Cheshire. This was extremely productive and helped me to understand the nurses’ opinions of implementing outcome based commissioning and quality improvement and how these changes affect their jobs first hand.

I have also been updating the CCG website creating an area for the Practice Nurses which has definitely challenged and improved my website designing skills!

NHS Expo Event!

31st August 2015- 4th September 2015

As the week was short due to the bank holiday, the week went even faster than usual- so apologies for the late blog post!

At the beginning of the week, I began writing my first contract for the Ophthalmology service. Before I started my placement, I had no idea how complex NHS contracts were so I definitely learnt a lot doing this and enjoyed doing it. 

On Thursday I had the privilege of attending the NHS Health and Care Innovation Expo 2015/16 event at Manchester Central Convention Centre. It was a big event over two days with around 5000 people attending each day. There were various exhibition stands, stimulating workshops in the ‘pop-up universities’ and key note speeches about Innovation and the Future NHS. I gained a great deal of knowledge and understanding at the workshops and enjoyed learning about the progress we are making and the new systems in place to defragment processes and ultimately improve quality. The NHS England Chief Executive Simon Stevens gave an interesting talk and Jeremy Hunt MP, The Secretary of State For Health challenged the NHS to ensure all patients were able to access their full medical records online by 2018, accompanied by a commitment to a review of data security.

Ultimately the event was a celebration of innovation and improvement in the NHS, to further integrate our efforts and spread adoption of the best new ideas. It was great to see how optimistic, ambitious and driven everyone was in improving the NHS. NHS England Chair Sir Malcom Grant closed the event highlighting the importance of innovation in the NHS and said innovation is a catalyst to productivity. He said “Innovation is the lifeblood of any successful industry – industries come up on the wave of innovation, but if they fail to continue innovating then they fail."

On Friday I attended my first Locality Meeting, which is a meeting between the GPs and Practice Managers in Eastern Cheshire and the CCG in order for us to provide the GPs with updates on work streams. This gave me a good overview of all the latest projects and the chance to meet the GPs. 

A month at the CCG!

24th August- 28th August 2015

I have officially worked one month at the CCG and it has flown by!

At the beginning of the week the Communications and Public Engagement team asked me to write an article for the local newspapers on behalf of a GP with the focus on high blood pressure, which will be published as part of the weekly 'Health Matters' column. The article was written in time for 'Know Your Numbers week!', a campaign designed to raise awareness of high blood pressure whereby participating pharmacies around England are giving free blood pressure tests. This was enjoyable to write as I learnt a great deal of new knowledge on blood pressure and it has also helped improve my writing skills! I am keen to get more involved with the Communications and Engagement team as my degree at university is in Business and Marketing so I am particularly interested to understand how the CCG promotes the organisation and engages with the public.

I’ve also been reviewing further CQUIN evidence reports for Quarter 1 (Commissioning for Quality and Innovation), though this time for CWP, our leading mental health provider.  I also attended my first ECT Service Quality Review meeting which is a monthly meeting involving members of the Trust updating the CCG on the quality of the services and any other quality concerns.

In addition to this, I have started working on Contracts which are a large responsibility of the CCG. The CCG is responsible for hundreds of contracts within Eastern Cheshire. It is extremely interesting to see how hospitals and other providers are paid through tariffs or block contracts which are similar to a price list for each procedure carried out by the hospital. I have been given the responsibility of assisting Sally who works in the contracts team with drawing up 8 contracts for an ophthalmology service.

I have thoroughly enjoyed my first month at the CCG and I am continuously understanding the crucial role that the CCG plays within the local health economy. 

ECCCG's Strategic Priorities

17th August 2015- 21st August 2015

This week at the CCG I have been involved in a number of new projects.

A particularly interesting task I am doing at the moment is assisting the Transformation/Caring Together team in determining the CCG’s Strategic Priorities for 2016/17. In order to do this, I am conducting an evidence search of our current priorities such as the CCG’s 5 Year Strategic plan  and how we are performing against these in order to see whether we will continue to include these as priorities for the following two years. I did this using JSNA (Joint Strategic Needs Assessment) data which was extremely interesting to look at as it includes important health statistics for the Eastern Cheshire population and our performance in comparison to the rest of England. I also used  relatively complex Quality Performance data to decide upon the key points we will need to focus on.

As well as this, I have been looking at a process termed Outcome Based Commissioning.  
This is a way of paying for health care and services based on outcomes that are important to the people using them whereas traditional commissioning focuses on organisational performance and processes such as the number of attendances, operations and procedures. There is a strong case for Outcome Based Commissioning and in order for ECCCG to implement this type of commissioning successfully in the future, firstly extensive research must be undertaken to see how viable it would be. I am responsible for conducting research on whether it is has been successful in other CCGs, if so how they made it successful and defining a sample process for implementing it. 

I have also been further introduced to how the CCG draws up contracts with providers which I am becoming slightly more familiar with! My third week has gone by extremely quickly again and I feel I am definitely gaining more of an understanding how a CCG works!

A busy second week!

10th August 2015 - 14th August 2015

I’ve had a great second week at the CCG- though it has flown by! The current placement student at the CCG, Emma, who I will be replacing has been absolutely brilliant helping me settle in to my new work environment and explaining everything to me (including the complicated NHS acronyms!) such as what her responsibilities are and the projects she has been involved in over the past year.

I’ve been working on CQUINs again this week as we’ve had many reports back from the providers as they report quarterly to the CCG. Subsequently, I evaluated the reports which listed their evidence of achieving the agreed milestones in order to determine whether it was sufficient or whether we required further evidence from them in order to release payment. I then discussed the reports with my manager and contacted the providers about the outcome. I have put this information regarding the CQUIN's progress and whether they have achieved their milestones for Quarter 1 into tables to enable other employees in the CCG to be aware of their performance which I am taking in to the Internal Contracts meeting to show.

I’ve been lucky enough to have the opportunity to undertake ‘The Edward Jenner’ Programme whilst I am on my placement here, which is a Leadership learning programme designed to help me build a strong foundation of leadership skills in order to enhance my confidence and competence whilst performing my role.  The programme consists of the latest research and thought leadership, talent management guides and webinars and there is a written marked piece of work at the end of the programme in order to attain the Edward Jenner accreditation.  

I’ve also created the agendas for meetings and had additional meetings with various members of staff within the CCG to further understand their roles and the projects they are involved in which can be particularly diverse.

I have also been introduced and begun working with a Finance system called ‘Oracle’ which is where all the invoices for the CCG come in and are processed. As well as this, I have been given access to the ECCCG website to enable me to edit the Quality section of the website and upload relevant documents to inform the public about Our Performance regularly.

Overall, my second week at the CCG has again been very busy, productive and enjoyable! 

My first week at the CCG!

3rd August 2015- 7th August 2015

Hello, welcome to my first blog post! My name is Katie Hall, I'm a student at Sheffield Hallam University (SHU) studying Business and Marketing. As part of my 'sandwich degree' I have the opportunity to undertake a professional placement year. I have secured a brilliant Business placement here at the NHS Eastern Cheshire Clinical Commissioning Group (ECCCG) working within The Business Management team and my role is "Quality and Commissioning Officer."

The first week of my placement has gone extremely well! Everyone at the CCG has been extremely friendly and welcoming. I've had a busy first week attending various meetings which has given me a good initial introduction of what happens on a daily basis in a CCG. I've also been meeting with other employees at the CCG in order to understand their roles better and reading and learning many interesting and useful NHS documents such as the Five Year Plan and ECCCG's prioirties for 2015-2016.

I've also began to learn about a very complex framework termed "CQUINS" which stands for Commissioning for Quality and Innovation. They enable commissioners such as ourselves to reward excellence by linking a certain amount of the provider's income to the achievement of local or national quality improvement goals. NHS England release CQUINs each year that each provider must achieve. I've also been looking at the multitude of complex contracts that the CCG is responsible for with various providers around Eastern Cheshire which I am keen to get more involved in.

Overall I've had a brilliant, informative and very productive first week at the CCG. I am looking forward to next week to learn more about the CCG and the vital role they have in planning, buying and monitoring healthcare services for the local population.

To find out more about ECCCG, visit www.easterncheshireccg.nhs.uk