Innovation

Hospital management took a back seat when staff were asked to come up with ideas on how to spend £1million donated by LNWH Charity.

The Charitable Fund Engagement Initiative attracted 1,300 ideas with staff voting for four winners. The winning entries, which were chosen from a shortlist of 12, will share the money.

“The competition really caught people’s imagination and we were overwhelmed with suggestions,” said David Jenkins, LNWH Charity Director.

“It empowered staff and gave them a voice about what they think is important and want to see the money spent on.”

The winning projects, which will implemented at our local hospitals, are:

• A greenspace transformation programme including an NHS nature recovery ranger to enhance and improve green space on hospital sites.
• A post-discharge medication support plan focused on patients prescribed antibiotics, steroids and opioids to help reduce readmissions and antimicrobial resistance
• Additional translation devices to expand and improve existing translation and language support tools to better communicate with patients whose first language isn’t English
• A breast cancer verification system allowing surgical teams to identify the border of normal tissue surrounding a tumour without samples having to be sent out of theatre.

The schemes will be introduced later this year.