The Statewide Anaesthesia and Perioperative Care Clinical Network’s (SWAPNet), Quality Focused Interventions for the Relief of Symptoms Team (QFIRST) project received this year’s top innovation award at the annual Health Roundtable (HRT) Patient Safety Improvement Group meeting last week.
QFIRST, sponsored by the Clinical Excellence Division, is an extension of the SWAPNet Pre-anaesthetic Evaluation Framework project and specifically focusses on the management of older/high risk persons presenting for surgery.
It involves the establishment of a multidisciplinary working group to explore the development of mechanisms to ensure the full range of options available to high risk patients are investigated prior to undergoing procedures and facilitates agreement regarding treatment that aligns with the patient’s wishes.
“It aims to improve the delivery of healthcare for high risk patients through shared decision making and patient engagement by providing a seamless continuity of care from decision to intervention that aligns with the patient’s goals to recovery (providing the right care in the right place at the right time),” Dr Alex Grosso, QFIRST Project Lead said.
PICTURED ABOVE: Dr Morne Terblanche, Medical Lead, Safety, Quality and Innovation, Sunshine Coast Hospital and Health Service and SWAPNet Steering Committee member receiving the HRT Certificate.
The HRT Patient Safety Improvement Group provides members an opportunity to share ideas and innovations that focus on improving the safety and quality of care within their health services and monitor progress against the HRT Patient Safety Checklist.
It enables members to network with a large number of health services from Australia and New Zealand, understand Patient Safety data and benchmark with others, gain more information on HRT indicators and data analysis, utilise HRT data to get ‘accreditation ready’ and learn from peers through the many member hospital innovations that are presented each year.
Congratulations to SWAPNet and the QFIRST Team at the Sunshine Coast University Hospital including Ms Ailsa McKitterick-Gillett (Project Officer) and Dr Grosso (Project Lead).
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