Part of Mid Cheshire Hospitals Foundation Trust: community connectivity challenges report
About the trust
This content is taken from an independent report commissioned by the Future Connectivity program and produced by Mid Cheshire Hospitals NHS Foundation trust.
The content of this report is supplier agnostic, which means we do not endorse any specific companies, innovations, or approaches. Any mention of, or link to, a specific supplier or product does not constitute an endorsement from NHS England.
For clarity, any recommendations made in this report are those of the report authors and do not represent any mandatory policy, or requirement from NHS England.
Background
Mid Cheshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (MCHFT) is an acute hospital trust in Cheshire. It runs Leighton Hospital in Crewe, Victoria Infirmary in Northwich, and Elmhurst Intermediate Care Centre in Winsford. MCHFT was established as an NHS Trust in April 1991, and became an NHS foundation trust in April 2008.
The trust provides healthcare services to a population of approximately 300,000 people living in and around Alsager, Crewe, Congleton, Knutsford, Middlewich, Nantwich, Northwich, Sandbach, and Winsford.
The Central Cheshire Integrated Care Partnership (CCICP) was formed on 1 October 2016 to provide transformation to the way in which care is provided in the community. CCICP covers Mid Cheshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (MCHFT), Cheshire and Wirral Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (CWPFT), the South Cheshire GP Alliance and Vale Royal GP Alliance and recognises that health services need to change to deliver sustainable services that meet the demands of an ageing population.
Previously, these services were provided by East Cheshire Trust and included a range of specialist and community health services.
As with all clinical services a reliable and up to date patient record is at the heart of good clinical care and the ability for all parties involved in patient care to be able to access the patient record is a necessity.
TUPE of staff
The initial transfer (TUPE) of staff from East Cheshire was for 350 staff.
In 2020, the East Cheshire Dermatology service was taken on by Mid Cheshire. This included 4 additional sites and 40 staff.
In 2022 CCICP took on the West Cheshire Paediatric Speech and Language service to add to their portfolio of community services, this included 7 additional sites and 50 staff.
The creation of the community service and the ongoing development of it presented a significant challenge to provide connectivity, suitable IT hardware and network infrastructure across multiple locations in Cheshire.
As of May 2024, the headcount in community service was over 1000 staff working across 30 locations.
Last edited: 23 October 2024 12:32 pm