Providing solutions in times of emergency
No one can predict the unpredictable – however, contingency plans can be drawn up to prepare for events that may threaten the continuum of delivering patient services.
Whether it is fire, flooding, infection or any other form of emergency, Vanguard Healthcare can provide immediate solutions to ensure that continuity and patient care do not suffer.
Vanguard provides instant solutions that mean healthcare providers can avoid long delays in restoring patient services. The experienced Vanguard logistics team can set up and connect a unit to services such as mains, drainage and electricity, within two hours and be ready to undertake operations within 48 hours.
Mobile healthcare units are the affordable solution when compared with procuring the services of private hospitals. They allow NHS Trusts to retain control of patient services and, therefore, maintain control of both reputation and revenue during and beyond the life of the crisis.
Read on to find out how Vanguard Healthcare ensured service provision continued in Tewkesbury after the catastrophic flooding in 2007 and at The Royal Marsden after its disastrous fire.
Catastrophic flooding in Tewkesbury failed to dampen service delivery
Hospital services in Gloucestershire were severely disrupted by the torrential flooding experienced in the summer of 2007. The market town of Tewkesbury was hit especially hard with the whole town centre effectively sealed off by flood water. The town’s hospital was virtually inaccessible, causing massive disruption and literally hundreds of operations to be cancelled.
Additional capacity was urgently needed to ensure that both service delivery and waiting lists did not spiral out of control. Working with Vanguard Healthcare, Gloucestershire health managers commissioned a mobile unit to allow clinical staff to continue to service demand.
NHS patients whose operations had been cancelled by the flood crisis were seen at a mobile day surgery unit in the grounds of a private hospital site in Cheltenham. Trust clinical teams working with Vanguard nurses and operating department practitioners provided a service to some 700 non-urgent day surgery patients.
In order to enable the main operating theatre at Tewkesbury Hospital to be refurbished as originally planned, Vanguard then moved its unit onto a car park at the hospital.
However, there was yet another drama within days of the mobile unit’s arrival in Tewkesbury. The rains returned to the town and the river levels rose yet again – this time threatening to flood the unit itself!
As Vanguard’s units are truly mobile, their technical team were able to quickly relocate it back to its former location in Cheltenham with the assistance of Gloucestershire Police and local residents, thus avoiding the ensuing dangers and allowing vital patient care to continue seamlessly.
Yvonne Pirso, Associate Director of Communications from Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, said: “Due to difficulties faced by patients in travelling around the county following the floods in mid-July and subsequent problems with water supply to both Cheltenham General Hospital and Gloucestershire Royal Hospital, we had to cancel and re-book 8,000 outpatient procedures and 1,200 inpatient operations in late July.”
“We were desperately in need of extra capacity so it was with huge relief that we were able to call on Vanguard’s mobile day surgery unit. Positive feedback from the patients treated was both widespread and praise-worthy. Many commented on how bright, clean and efficient the facilities were, while our own clinical teams were impressed by how well equipped it was.”
Steve Peak, former Director of Service Delivery for the Trust, added: “If we had not developed this mobile service we would have not been able to beat the floods in this way and this episode shows just how flexible the service is.”
Serious fire at The Royal Marsden ... yet still patients receive high-quality care
In January 2008, a fire damaged a large part of the roof at The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust, a world renowned cancer hospital in London. During the fire, much of the roof was destroyed and there was smoke and water damage to a number of other areas including wards and operating theatres, which affected the hospital’s surgical capacity.
Vanguard’s team swung into immediate action, with an initial offer to provide short-term mobile wards to be installed the day after the fire, at no charge. The offer of a ward was accepted, which was later joined by a mobile operating theatre at the hospital’s Sutton site where additional surgery was taking place while the theatres in Chelsea were being recommissioned.
Tim Wigmore, The Royal Marsden’s Head of Critical Care said: “Vanguard has built an excellent relationship with clinical staff and our estates department. From the outset we had an immediate requirement to provide resource to ensure we were able to treat patients on site. Vanguard not only provided the solution but also their assistance at a time when we needed to focus on remediation and other pressing tasks.”
The configuration of the ward and operating theatre had been augmented by sealed access corridors, similar to an airport hub, joining the mobile units to the existing building.
Pam Moores, Vanguard’s Operations Manager, added: “From a patient’s perspective, you wouldn’t believe that you were not in the main hospital facility. It really is a seamless extension. The solution not only helped The Royal Marsden in the short term with its obvious requirement for capacity, but enabled the Trust to meet their workload targets whilst being able to concentrate on its planned re-building programme of the fire damaged area.”
