As part of their digital strategy, the Trust wanted to review their EPR system for its Mental Health Services.

Leeds contracted Apira to carry out an initial six-week review.

• Existing EPR was over 10 years old and originally implemented as an interim solution
• Greater integration with key clinical systems
• Ongoing negative feedback from EPR users
• Cost savings needed to be addressed
• Support for remote working for staff and reduction in travel costs
• More intuitive systems now available
• Requirement to support the Mental Health Act

Advanced’s CareDirector was selected as the new EPR solution. This was a system widely used in social care and deployed successfully across Mental Health Services in Wales. Apira was able to facilitate a valuable site visit to Wales for key members of the team in Leeds. The visit demonstrated an impressive solution with an intuitive and modern interface, single view dashboards and flexible search capabilities.

As a result of the in-depth specification and a thorough staff adoption programme from Apira, the new EPR system delivered clear benefits to the Trust:

• Increased efficiencies: Quicker access to patient information for staff, from anywhere in the hospital.
• Improved access: The new system is accessible from a range of devices (laptops/PCs, computers on wheels, iPads, mobile phones) and supports increased staff working remotely.
• Improved patient experience: Patients do not have to repeat their medical history and are reassured their care is delivered in a more joined-up way
• Increased patient safety: Integration with other systems provides a more accurate view of a patient and the care provided.

Apira led a phased procurement process with clear goals set for the Trust at each stage. The advice was to take a ‘big bang’ approach to deployment of the system in Leeds. This was in part because the new EPR could support increased levels of remote working for staff. At the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, Apira were able to guide Leeds through a dummy go-live of the solution which enabled frontline staff to familiarise themselves with and thoroughly test out the new system.

As a result of the in-depth specification and a thorough staff adoption programme from Apira, the new EPR system delivered clear benefits to the Trust:

• Test launch enabled users to trial the system before go-live
• Due to the nature of mental health services, a ‘big bang’ approach to go live was required
• 2,500 users of the system deployed at launch
• Fifty floorwalkers initially planned to support go-live – due to Covid-19, instead, 25 staff supported the Trust 24/7 providing remote support to staff via mailbox, screen-sharing and a helpdesk
• 120 digital change leads were selected across the Trust as ‘champions’ of the service, however., Many were redeployed in other areas due to Covid-19 so Apira facilitated regular engagement with the change leads and provided workshops for them to support staff and demonstrate how the system worked
• The new system was able to cope with the increased demand of remote users working from home due to-Covid 19

The benefits are clear – Apira helped us to quickly deliver a reliable, scalable system, accessible remotely for clinical staff. The integration with key clinical systems was vital and enabled more clinical time with patients.

Dr Nick Venters
CCIO

Apira continues to support Leeds as the EPR system develops and delivers more benefits. This includes a patient portal and improved dashboards, as well as bespoke dashboards for specific teams’ requirements and refinements to the patient timeline view.

Due to the success of the EPR project, the Trust has recently commissioned Apira to work on a new business case for a new Electronic Document Management system.

“The rigour and detail that Apira demonstrated ensured the contract between us and the supplier was watertight in terms of payment milestones and delivery. Their attention to detail throughout the process paid dividends for the Trust.”

Dr Nick Venters
CCIO