Making time to care : a productivity journey
Fiona Taylor and Peter Bampton-Clare explain how the development of a caseload weighting tool has reduced waiting times and given staff more ‘ time to care ’
© GettyImages / nadia _ bormotova
Time for care is a programme to help practice teams manage their workload , adopt and spread innovations that free-up clinical time for care , and develop the skills and confidence to lead to local improvement ( NHS England 2016 ).
The Buckinghamshire learning disability occupational therapy service is part of Hertfordshire Partnership NHS University Foundation Trust ’ s ( HPFT ) specialist learning disability service .
The occupational therapy team makes up part of a wider multidisciplinary community learning disability health team . The occupational therapy service is made up of 5.5 whole time equivalent staff , ranging in banding from band four assistant therapy practitioners to management input from a band 8a occupational therapy professional lead .
Referrals are received from a variety of sources and are to provide specialist assessment and intervention covering sensory processing difficulties , skill development work and specialist equipment , and the length of intervention can range between several weeks to over a year .
A look at productivity and staff wellbeing In April 2018 , the Buckinghamshire learning disability occupational therapy service had a long allocation list with service users waiting up to 56 weeks for assessment . Staff had full caseloads and seemed to be working at full capacity .
A wellbeing survey was completed anonymously with staff , which showed that only 25 per cent of staff felt their time was being well spent as an occupational therapist . Half felt that their workload was unmanageable and 75 per cent agreed that they faced unrealistic time pressures , often working over their contracted hours .
We realised that we needed to look at how productive and effective the working time was being spent to see if there were improvements that could
34 OTnews December 2020