Somerset NHS FT uses Infinity Health Tool to boost capacity

Somerset NHS Foundation Trust replacing non-emergency bleeps (pagers) on its wards with an Infinity Health tool, has supported junior doctors to provide more care for patients.

The task management tool has helped postgraduate doctors in training to complete 42% more tasks in two years. Infinity’s solution helps teams to create and assign tasks, bringing together the right information, and allows them to track activity in real time.

In comparison, traditional bleeps are tasks, but they lack detail and context, leading to doctors having to spend time phoning the bleep initiator to gain more information. Somerset had already recruited an out of hours coordinator to act as a central point of contact to triage task requests from wards to the out of hours team. However, as they workload intensified the decision was made to implement Infinity to help them triage, prioritise and allocate tasks.

Sophie Gealy, postgraduate doctor in training, Somerset NHS Foundation Trust, said: “Infinity has made a big difference. I’m provided with much more information a lot faster, meaning my job list is easily visualised, easier to prioritise and makes task management a lot slicker. It’s more secure and there’s accountability when assigning tasks, which can be an issue with verbal handover of tasks.”

Since the solution was deployed at the trust in May 2021, doctors have been able to free up time from the inefficient bleeps system, and instead focusing on completing tasks for patients such as clinical reviews, diagnostics and treatments.

At the start of the partnership the team at Somerset were completing an average of 36 tasks per shift. By April 2023, the team had increased this to 51 tasks per shift. In addition, an independent first-year report led by Unity Insights, revealed a 91 minutes per user per shift saving.

Elliott Engers, CEO, Infinity Health, said: “Our previous user surveys showed that Infinity was giving Somerset staff 1.5 hours back per shift and now we know that an increase in capacity is allowing them to do more tasks for patients such as clinical reviews, diagnostic tests, and treatments.

“As overstretched NHS staff work hard to reduce long waiting lists, Infinity can make it easier by helping them to do their job more efficiently, safely, and with less stress.”