News

30 September 2011

Regional Innovation Fund 2011/12

The call for the latest round of Regional Innovation Fund (RIF) awards is now open - deadline for applications 4pm Friday 14 October 2011.

The awards will be made to assist North West NHS organisations (Clinical Commissioning Groups or NHS Trusts) to adopt/share existing RIF projects carried out either in the North West or nationally.

Applications are invited for £15,000 adoption bursaries and £5,000 innovation sharing awards:

• Adoption bursaries will be awarded to applicants wishing to adopt the successful projects and who can demonstrate that they are ready to implement the innovation/project quickly.
• Innovation sharing awards will be awarded to encourage greater understanding of an innovation.  For example to run a workshop, produce written material or allow for staff time to explain its benefit to others.

A full listing of North West RIF projects can found on our web portal .

Nationally, there have been over 200 RIF projects across England, captured in the RIF Tube Map which support the QIPP initiatives.

With regard to the bursary award, NHS North West would like to draw attention to the following case studies:

Preventing Repeat Alcohol Admissions

Use of IT to support Speech and Language therapy in stroke services

Interactive health services using digital TV and mobile phone

Monitoring diabetes with new innovative TeleHealth solution

PROMS 2.0 Measuring outcomes

Electronic Personal Assessment Questionnaire 

With regard to the sharing award, NHS North West would like to draw attention to the following case studies:

Project Health

Improving care for breast cancer patients

e-clinics in Cardiology

Both the Adoption Bursary application form and the Sharing and Learning application form should be submitted to Innovation@northwest.nhs.uk by 4pm Friday 14th October 2011.

Following a short listing process, successful applicants for the bursary awards will be invited to attend a coaching workshop facilitated by the Young Foundation in early November 2011.

Case studies and further information available at http://www.advancingqualityalliance.nhs.uk/innovation/

 

05 May 2011

InnovateNoW update

The projects awarded funding from the InnovateNoW programme are now well under way. Some projects have now finished and others will be completed within the next year or so.

Case studies on all of the projects that have received InnovateNoW funding can be found on the North West Innovation Portal.

If you have any queries on about any other issues related to your InnovateNoW award, please contact Andrew McCorkle.

 

06 January 2011

NHS Innovation Challenge Prizes

The NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement is looking for innovations that have demonstrated benefits in one of the following areas:

• Challenge 1 - Better management of pregnancy - Achieve a 10% reduction in the numbers of pre-term births through the better management of risks.
• Challenge 2 - Medicines - reducing waste, increasing benefits - To reduce avoidable medicines waste by 50% and increase adherence to high cost and critical medicines regimes by 30%.
• Challenge 3 - A reduction of MSSA and/or E.Coli bactraemias - across a health economy by 30%.
• Challenge 4 - Increasing dependence for those with kidney failure.
• Challenge 5 - Earlier cancer diagnosis - Achieve a step change in the proportion of patients with cancer at stages 1 and 2 rather than at the later stages (3 and 4).
• Challenge 6 - To increase the number of people who receive emergency care in the right place and complete their care in the first location.
• Challenge 7 - Reducing avoidable attendences at GP surgeries and other primary care settings by 20%, with no reduction in quality of service.

The deadline for applications is Monday 24 January 2011 and the value of the prizes will be recommended by the expert panel judging the applications on a case by case basis.

For further information visit: http://www.challengeprizes.institute.nhs.uk/

 

20 December 2010

Transforming Community Services (TCS) Multi-professional Leadership Challenges - £50k

The Department of Health is running a Transforming Community Services (TCS) Multi-professional Leadership Challengein each region (10 in total) between February and March 2011, with a £50,000 award for each of the regional winning teams to implement their service improvement idea for the first year.

The challenges are aimed at health professionals (GPs, Allied Health Professionals, Nurses etc) working along a community service pathway, but can include non-professionals (e.g. Health Care Assistants). The aim of the leadership challenges are to develop empowered, autonomous health and social care professionals to lead change through innovative service improvement. This will drive up clinical leadership and enable multi-professional, collaborative decision making in the commissioning, planning and delivery of patient focused, high quality, clinical services in alignment with GP Cpnsortia. To apply for an award, a multi-professional team application must be subitted with an innovative collaborative service improvement or pathway idea, which aligns with the Quality, Innovation, Prevention and Productivity (QIPP) agenda and local regional / demographic needs.

The deadline for teams to email completed registration forms directly to melissa.fileppi@dh.gsi.gov.uk is 5pm Friday 21 January 2011.

The North West’s leadership challenge event will be held on Monday 28 February 2011 to identify the best regional and national clinical teams, within community and primary care.  The event will create a condensed, virtual best practice learning environment where multi-professional teams will arrive with a service improvement idea. Through a facilitated process, the teams will be challenged to collaboratively demonstrate the validity of their scheme, assessed by a panel of multi-professional experts to determine the winning team from each region.  Each regional winning team will be awarded £50,000 to implement their scheme for the first year.

The national final on 24 March 2011 will be a showcase and celebration of the regional winning teams and their service improvement ideas. A minister will officially present the award and there will be national press coverage of the event. This will be a national opportunity to show case multi-disciplinary clinically led best practice schemes and SHA Providers.

For more information and to download an application form, visit the NHS Networks web site:

http://www.networks.nhs.uk/news/transforming-community-services-tcs-multi-professional-leadership-challenges-for-all-primary-community-care-clinical-teams

For more details, contact: Jo.Partington@dh.gsi.gov.uk, Management Fellow (City University), AHP Clinical Lead, Transforming Community Services Team, Department of Finance, Performance & Operations.

 

20 December 2010

The Lancashire and Cumbria Health, Innovation and Education Cluster (L&C HIEC) second call for project bids

The purpose of all HIECs is to enable high quality patient care and services, by quickly bringing the benefits of research and innovation directly to front line staff and by strengthening the co-ordination of education and training so that it has the breadth and depth to support excellence.  The L&C HIEC aims to create a sustainable culture of the timely and effective dissemination and implementation of research and innovation into health education and practice.

 

If you are based in Lancashire and Cumbria and can answer ‘yes’ to one or more of the following you may be eligible to apply for funding from the HIEC:

 

• Have you developed new best practice that could be shared with others?
• Do you have research findings related to health and healthcare delivery to implement?
• Are you aware of innovative ways of working or a new innovation that could benefit healthcare?
• Are you looking for ways to share your research/innovation/best practice?
• Do you have an innovative approach to delivering education and training to the health community?

 

The L&C HIEC is particularly looking for projects which:

 

• Enhance the uptake of educational opportunities among all groups of healthcare staff
• Improve knowledge acquisition and knowledge transfer across organisations and regions
• Improve and deliver education and training for health and healthcare outcomes
• Use technology (e.g. the Map of Medicine) to enhance the delivery of best practice into care pathways and patient care
• Offer new ways to provide the best possible case for the local population and reduce health inequalities.

 

For more information, visit: http://www.northlancshealth.nhs.uk/mom/lchiec_projectcall.pdf

 

To obtain an application form contact rosalind.way@northlancs.nhs.uk (Tel 01524 519320).

 

The deadline for submission of applications is 31 January 2011, and projects must be able to start in April 2011.

 

 

14 December 2010

Round 4 Innovation Sharing and Bursary winners announced

A panel of experts met at the end of November to discuss and assess a short-list of Innovation Sharing and Innovation Bursary award applications from the fourth round of funding (no Enabling Change award applications were invited for round 4). From these discussions a total of 18 applications have been awarded funds for their innovations, 6 of which are Innovation Sharing Awards, the other 12 being Innovation Bursary Awards.

The awardees will receive their funding by January 2011 and will be expected to complete their projects by the end of 2011.

Click Here for details of all winners from rounds 1, 2, 3 and 4.

 

11 October 2010

Success across the board at Dragons' Lair 3

The third Dragons’ Lair event recently took place at NHS North West’s Manchester headquarters with five pitches awarded funding: two Enabling Change innovations from InnovateNoW and three Trust Nominated pitches.

One of the two Enabling Change awards ‘Embedding evidence-based psychological personality disorder in community teams’ will roll-out dialectical behavioural therapy (DBT) in the community setting to treat patients with borderline personality disorders. The other enabling change award  winner ‘Probation health trainer service’ will extend a Rochdale-based pilot where ex-offenders are employed to promote health services benefits to their peers who traditionally do not access these services.

‘Rapid access blackout triage clinics’ was the first of three Trust Nominated innovations to be awarded funding and will see collaboration between two major North West NHS Trusts to pilot a scheme where a web-based clinical assessment tool is used to perform an initial evaluation of patients who experience blackouts. ‘Pathway Planner’ is a piece of software which can simulate and predict clinical and financial outcomes of a scenario and can be used to inform commissioning by determining whether the changes identified are appropriate and will be of benefit and will be evaluated in  three separate NHS Trusts in the North West, starting at Central and Eastern Cheshire PCT. Finally, ‘Nanopool Liquid Glass’ is a durable molecular coating which is designed to be used on a variety of surfaces to provide an easy to clean and antimicrobial barrier. The funding will be used to coat toys and a whole isolation room at Alder Hey Hospital to provide information for a long term decontamination strategy.

The event signals the completion of the third round of funding from the InnovateNoW programme. Round 4 is currently underway and focuses on NHS North West’s recently revised Clinical Pathway Groups as well as recommendations from Healthier Horizons and delivering the QIPP (quality, innovation, productivity and prevention) agenda.

The Dragons were made up of Chief Executives and Directors from NHS organisations; see below for a full list of Dragons at this event:

Dragon	Position	Organisation
Mike Farrar	Chief Executive	NHS North West
Tony Bell	Chief Executive	Royal Liverpool & Broadgreen University Hospitals NHS Trust
Dr Bill Forsyth	Medical Director	Central & Eastern Cheshire PCT
Kirsten Major	Interim Director, Health System Development	NHS North West
Steve Spoerry	Chief Executive	NHS East Lancashire
Rowena Young	Programme Director	Young Foundation

 

The Dragons consider one of the pitches. Left to Right: Mike Farrar, Steve Spoerry, Tony Bell, Kirsten Major, Rowena Young.

 

8 September 2010

New Clinical Pathway Group recommendations

As advised in the guidance document for round 4, NHS North West have now released their new Clinical Pathway Group recommendations. Please follow this link and refer to these throughout your application.

 

18 August 2010

Round 4 launch

Round 4 funding has been launched and applications are invited for Innovation Sharing and Innovation Bursary awards. Applicants must follow the guidance and the deadline for entries is Friday 8 October 2010 at 4pm.

 

02 August 2010

InnovateNoW Event review

On Thursday 29 July 2010, TrusTECH hosted an event on behalf of NHS North West to give potential applicants to the InnovateNoW Awards advice on how to successfully complete an application, and information on the criteria and recommendations their innovations should address. The event was highly over-subscribed and we would like to thank all who attended.

For those who were unable to secure a place on the event due to the high demand, we are happy to share with you and your colleagues and teams the slides from the day. Please follow the links below:

• Francesca Cignola, Regional Innovation Fund Advisory Service (RIFAS), Overview of the Regional Innovation Funds at a National Level
• Andrew McCorkle, NHS North West , Background to and aims of the Regional Innovation Fund
• Michelle Martin , TrusTECH, Award Categories, funding, success rates, application and judging process
• Carl Peachey, TrusTECH, Navigating the InnovateNoW website and the online application system
• Joanne Thomas, TrusTECH, What makes a good/bad application and information about Round 4
• Suzanne McDonald, Salford Royal NHS Foundation Trust, Experience of a previous successful applicant

We have also added some new FAQs to reflect the questions posed by delegates during the question and answer session.

If you have any questions about the above presentations, please contact us.

 

15 July 2010

Round 3 Innovation Sharing and Bursary winners announced

A panel of experts recently met to discuss and assess a short-list of applications from the third round of funding. From these discussions a total of 20 applications have been awarded funds for their innovations, 10 of which are Innovation Sharing Awards, the other 10 being Innovation Bursary Awards.

A short-list of Enabling Change Award applications were also assessed and a small number of these innovators have been invited to complete a stage 2 (full) application, which will be reviewed by the expert panel during July and August.

Click here for details of all winners from from rounds 1, 2 and 3.

 

01 July 2010

Most wanted innovation tools

NHS North West held two events in June for round 1 and round 2 winners with the aim of identifying progress to date and to share learning. Common issues were highlighted and based on this we have added useful links to a suite of tools hosted on the NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement website to help you understand, develop and implement a culture of innovation in your organisation.

For a full listing, visit the links page.

 

29 June 2010

Event on applying to the Regional Innovation Fund

Event update: this event is now heavily oversubscribed. TrusTECH will be contacting all registrants shortly to confirm places and reserve list. However, all slides and handouts will be made available on this website after the event.

TrusTECH will host an event on behalf of NHS North West, to provide information and advice on how to apply for a Regional Innovation Fund (InnovateNoW) Award.

The half day event will be held on Thursday 29th July 2010 (9:30am - 1:30pm) in the Nowgen Centre at Manchester Royal Infirmary and refreshments and lunch will be provided.

The event will cover:

• Why the Regional Innovation Fund (RIF) has been established.
• What types of awards are available.
• How to apply for an award.
• The judging process and success rate of applications.
• What makes a good application.

PLEASE NOTE THAT THERE WILL BE NO ENABLING CHANGE AWARDS MADE IN THE NEXT ROUND (ROUND 4) OF INNOVATENOW, THEREFORE THIS EVENT WILL CONCERNTRATE ON APPLYING FOR INNOVATION SHARING AND INNOVATION BURSARY AWARDS.

Registration for the event is free, but places are limited so they will be allocated on a first-come-first-served basis.

To reserve a place, please contact Carl Peachey (carl.peachey@cmft.nhs.uk) by 22nd July 2010, giving your name, job title, organisation, e-mail address and contact phone number.

 

14 June 2010

Round 2 InnovateNoW Face the Dragons

Six teams of NHS Innovators from across the North West impressed a panel of “Dragons” with their flair for innovation at the Dragons’ Lair event, held at the NHS North West headquarters in Manchester.

The Dragons interrogate one of the pitchers. Left to right: Mike Farrar, Kirsten Major, Catherine Beardshaw, Mike Cheshire, Patrick Geraghty.

The Dragons*, made up of Chief Executives and Directors from NHS organisations across the North West, were awarding funding to successful pitchers to put their ideas into practice.

Amongst the ideas successful in their funding requests were: Patientrack, an early warning software system designed to alert clinical staff to changes in the early warning scores of critically ill patients; PROMS 2.0, patient reported outcome measures web-based questionnaire; Talking Leaflets, recorded information for patients that is accessible by ringing a geographical telephone number; Anticipatory Care Calendar for people with learning disabilities and dementia, and Implementation of a system-wide pathway for the management of heart failure.

Five of the six teams pitching at the event were awarded full or part funding. Two of the successful teams were pitching for Enabling Change Awards from the Regional Innovation Fund. The other three successful teams were awarded smaller amounts of funding as Trust Nominated innovations.

InnovateNoW offers funding ranging from £5,000 to £250,000 through three different award schemes. Applications must come from NHS organisations in the North West, but can include partnerships with other healthcare bodies, universities and private or volunteer sector partners from anywhere in the UK.

The InnovateNoW programme focuses on addressing the recommendations of Healthier Horizons and Clinical Pathway Groups in the region and delivering QIPP(Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention) agenda.

* list of Dragons at 28th May event:

Dragon	Position	Organisation
Mike Farrar	Chief Executive	NHS North West
Patrick Geraghty	Fund Advisor, Regional Innovation Fund Advisory Service	Young Foundation
Dr Steve Ryan	Medical Director	Alder Hey Children's Hospital NHS Foundation Trust
Catherine Beardshaw	Chief Executive	Warrington and Halton Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
Dr Bill Forsyth	Medical Director	Central & Eastern Cheshire PCT
Kirsten Major	Interim Director, Health System Development	NHS North West
Dr Mike Cheshire	Medical Director Consultant Physician in Geriatric and General Medicine	NHS North West & Central Manchester University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
Gail Richards	Chief Executive	NHS Oldham
Sally Chisholm	Chief Executive	National Technology Adoption Centre
Dr Steve Ward	Medical Director	NHS Central Lancashire

 

 

27 May 2010

Round 2 InnovateNoW Enabling Change finalists invited to Dragons' Lair

The second round Enabling Change category finalists of the InnovateNoW awards, aimed at encouraging and spreading innovative practices and services in the NHS, will be taking part in a ‘Dragons’ Lair’ event on Friday 28th May.

The event, hosted by NHS North West and managed on their behalf by TrusTECH®, will see six teams pitching to the Dragons, consisting of Chief Executive of NHS North West (Mike Farrar) NHS Executive Directors and other senior figures, for the opportunity to win funding for their ideas.

Two of the teams, made up of NHS staff, will be pitching for funds from the Enabling Change fund. These finalists were successful in a two-stage application process, and now have the opportunity to pitch for funding up to £250,000 (£50,000 per organisation involved in the innovation).

In addition to the Enabling Change pitchers, NHS North West has selected a number of proposals from other sources who can pitch for funding from a separate fund. These are known as Trust Nominated pitches.

Details of the successful pitches will be announced and available on the TrusTECH® and InnovateNoW websites in the week commencing Monday 7th June.

 

10 May 2010

Amount of funding available for 2010/11

There is now only two days to go before the deadline for round 3 InnovateNoW funding applications (Wednesday 12 May 2010, 4pm).  For rounds 3 and 4 in 2010/2011, there is £150,000 available for Innovation Sharing Awards (up to £5k each), £450,000 available for Innovation Bursary Awards (up to £25k each), and £500,000 available for Enabling Change Awards (up to £250k each).

 

14 April 2010

Third round of funding opens

Applications for awards from the third round of funding from the InnovateNoW scheme are now invited and must be submitted by Wednesday 12 May 2010 at 4pm. The third round of awards will focus on addressing the recommendations of Healthier Horizons and the Clinical Pathway Groups and delivering the QIPP (quality, innovation, productivity and prevention) agenda. An additional requirement (which is new for 2010/2011) is that applications must demonstrate how they will be working across organisations (e.g. primary and secondary care, or primary and social care).

10 February 2010

Second round winners announced

Fourteen projects have won funding under the second round of the InnovateNoW Awards. Nine of these will receive an Innovation Bursary Award while the remaining five have been given an Innovation Sharing Award.

An announcement on the Enabling Change Awards - for which application is a two-stage process - will be made within the next week. Those selected to go through to the second stage will be invited to submit a full application by 31 March and pitch their ideas at a Dragons' Lair event on 28 May before a panel of senior NHS managers and business figures.

See the full list of award winners.

 

8 February 2010

Dragons back innovative ideas

Six NHS teams proposing innovative ways to improve healthcare services have won the funding to put their ideas into practice at a Dragons’ Lair event run by NHS North West.

They were amongst eight teams who pitched to the ‘dragons’ – a combination of senior NHS managers and business people – with the aim of winning financial backing from the £1.9m regional innovation fund for healthcare.

The 'dragons' make their decision. Pictured from left to right, are Mike Farrar, Joe Rafferty, Denis Gizzi, Steve Ward and Rowena Young

The winning ideas include a project to relieve pressure on accident and emergency units by diverting less serious cases to a community-based centre, and a way to reduce hospital admissions by patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder (COPD) through an early warning system alerting them to extreme weather and environmental hazards.

Two others relate to surgical operations. One aims to reduce the number of operations that have to be cancelled on the day by improving assessment of patents’ conditions beforehand, while another will encourage the use of a monitoring device during surgery which has the potential to reduce deaths and complications and cut the amount of time patients spend recovering in hospital afterwards.

Two other projects will benefit stroke victims – providing 24-hour access to medical expertise in the immediate aftermath of a stroke by linking hospitals with a remote network of stroke specialists able to assess patients via a broadband link, and the use of computer technology to provide enhanced speech and language therapy.

A further two ideas failed to win backing from the innovation fund but the dragons recommended that they should go ahead in some format through mainstream NHS funding. One aimed to reorganise rheumatology services, the other to promote the use of cardiac monitors by critical care doctors, rather than restrict such monitoring to heart specialists.

The event was held at the NowGen Centre in Manchester and organised by the North West NHS Innovation Hub, TrusTECH®, on behalf of NHS North West. Three of the winners had applied for an Enabling Change Award through the InnovateNoW programme, the three others were proposed by NHS North West which directs the regional innovation fund.

One of the winners, Dr Daniel Conway, said: “Taking part in the Dragon’s Lair was exciting. Being challenged by the dragons really made us think about the impact of our proposal and how to make it as effective as possible.”

Dr Richard Deed, Innovation Unit Manager, said: “We are looking for ideas that will help us achieve greater productivity and improve the quality of care. We already have a track record for innovation in the NHS across the North West. The Dragon’s Lair event aims to build on that and develop a culture of innovation and change.” See details of Enabling Change winners and other Dragons' Lair winners.

The dragons were Mike Farrar, Chief Executive of NHS North West; Rowena Young, SHA Funding Advisor with Nesta; Kirsten Major, Interim Director, Health Service Development at NHS North West; Denis Gizzi, Assistant Director of Modernisation at NHS Oldham; Judith Griffin, Chief Executive of NHS Blackburn with Darwen; Dr Bill Forsyth, Medical Director of Central & Eastern Cheshire PCT; Peter Akid, Chief Executive of the Collaborative Commercial Agency; Tony Bell, Chief Executive of Royal Liverpool and Broadgreen University Hospitals NHS Trust; Dr Steve Ward, Medical Director of NHS Central Lancashire; Dr Sally Bradley, Deputy Medical Director of The Pennine Acute Hospitals NHS Trust; Joe Rafferty, Chief Executive of NHS Central Lancashire; and Alex Stevenson, Partner at Aquarius Equity Partners.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Above: Dr Ash Patel presents his case. Below: Mike Farrar, Chief Executive of NHS North West, explains the aims of the Dragons' Lair event

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

18 December 2009

First round winners announced

The winners of the Innovation Bursary Awards and Innovation Sharing Awards from the first round of funding have now been announced. Eleven projects have been selected to receive an Innovation Bursary Award while ten projects will receive an Innovation Sharing Award. The successful projects, together with the name of the applicant and their trust or organisation, are listed below. Applications for the first round of funding closed on 30 October.

View the full list of winners.

 

20 November 2009

Guide to applications is now available

A guide containing tips on what makes a good application is now available. The document has been produced in response to some of the applications submitted in the first round of funding. Click here to download a pdf version of the document.

 

12 November 2009

 

Second round of funding opens

Applications for the second round of awards in the InnovateNoW scheme have now opened and must be submitted by 4.00pm Friday 18 December 2009.  As with the first round which closed on 30 October, entries for the second round will focus on long-term conditions - such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and diabetes - and end of life care. However all applications will be considered provided they comply with the awards criteria.

 

21 September 2009

Patients to benefit from bright ideas

Patients across the North West are set to benefit from good ideas for improving their treatment and care, thanks to a new programme asking NHS staff to share their bright ideas for boosting healthcare services.

Through the InnovateNoW programme, the NHS in the North West is asking its quarter of a million staff to suggest ways to provide even better care for patients across the region. The aim is to create long-term improvements in healthcare by encouraging the adoption of innovative services.

InnovateNoW will run over a five-year period and provide funding to help staff implement their good ideas and train other people how to use them. It is one of a series of Regional Innovation Funds set up by the Department of Health across the country.

The deadline for funding applications to InnovateNoW is 30 October 2009. It is open to any staff from NHS organisations in the North West, including hospital and primary care teams. Applicants can also be working in partnership with GP practices, health charities, universities and companies based anywhere in the UK.

Alison Tonge, the director leading the innovation programmes at NHS North West, said: “Encouraging innovation and improving quality, productivity and prevention is a key focus for the NHS. The InnovateNoW programme has been set up by NHS North West to help to work towards these goals. We have a large and highly skilled workforce in our region, and there are bound to be lots of great ideas out there that we simply haven't tapped into yet.

“We want NHS staff to suggest as broad a range of new ideas as possible. For example, they may have pioneered a new approach to end of life care which will enable more people with terminal illnesses to die at home with their loved ones rather than in hospital. Or they may have good ideas about making support for patients with chronic conditions such as lung disease or diabetes more effective.

"InnovateNoW will provide the resources to help staff implement a new and innovative way of working, a new or improved process, patient pathway or partnership that supports efficiency and enhances patient care. A little investment now can help us gain a lot in terms of improved patient care and even better value for money."

InnovateNoW is being managed by the North West NHS Innovation Hub, TrusTECH®, on behalf of NHS North West.