33†NHSBT tissue and eye services clinical support nurse team: advanced nursing practice.

NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) Tissue and Eye Services (TES) save and improve the lives of thousands of patients every year.The Clinical Support Nurse Team (CSNT) within TES is an example of registered nurses working at an advanced level, making professionally autonomous decisions for which they are accountable.The concept of nurses working at this level began with a pilot study in 2012 under a robust governance system and change process within NHSBT. The development and progress of the team has also been reviewed by NHSBT Clinical Audit.The CSNT currently comprises two band 7 nurses and a band 8a manager who work together to safely assess and authorise donated tissue for transplant. There are plans to expand the team in 2022 and to ensure that the work is underpinned by a suitable academic framework that reflects the level of clinical responsibility. The CSNT work in conjunction with TES medical consultants who provide education, guidance and governance.The team is required to use complex reasoning, critical thinking, reflection and analysis to inform their assessment and clinical judgement.CSNT practice is guided by the Donor Selection Guidelines set by the Joint United Kingdom (UK) Blood Transfusion and Tissue Transplantation Services Professional Advisory Committee (2013). These guidelines stipulate contraindications to tissue donation on which the CSNT bases clinical decisions to ensure the safety of the recipients of any donated tissue by ruling out the chances of contracting any transmissible illness or transplanting tissue of compromised quality.Although a large component of the TES CSNT workload is to authorise donor files from deceased donors there are also living donation programmes. CSNT also review the Autologous/Allogeneic Serum Eye Drop Programme (ASE/AlloSE). This involves reviewing clinical requests made by ophthalmologists for serum eye drop options.This is a brief summary of how CSNT nurses apply their expert knowledge and skills to a broad range of Clinically challenging and complex situations.

Re-orienting a remote acute care model towards a primary health care approach: key enablers.

INTRODUCTION: The objective of this study was to identify the key enablers of change in re-orienting a remote acute care model to comprehensive primary healthcare delivery. The setting of the study was a 12-bed hospital in Fitzroy Crossing, Western Australia. METHODS: Individual key informant, in-depth interviews were completed with five of six identified senior leaders involved in the development of the Fitzroy Valley Health Partnership. Interviews were recorded and transcripts were thematically analysed by two investigators for shared views about the enabling factors strengthening primary healthcare delivery in a remote region of Australia. RESULTS: Participants described theestablishment of a culturally relevant primary healthcare service, using a community-driven, 'bottom up' approach characterised by extensive community participation. The formal partnership across the government and community controlled health services was essential, both to enable change to occur and to provide sustainability in the longer term. A hierarchy of major themes emerged. These included community participation, community readiness and desire for self-determination; linkages in the form of a government community controlled health service partnership; leadership; adequate infrastructure; enhanced workforce supply; supportive policy; and primary healthcare funding. CONCLUSIONS: The strong united leadership shown by the community and the health service enabled barriers to be overcome and it maximised the opportunities provided by government policy changes. The concurrent alignment around a common vision enabled implementation of change. The key principle learnt from this study is the importance of community and health service relationships and local leadership around a shared vision for the re-orientation of community health services.

Strengthening primary health care: achieving health gains in a remote region of Australia.

OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the impact of a comprehensive primary health care service model on key health performance indicators in a remote region of Australia. DESIGN AND SETTING: A cross-sectional 6-year retrospective evaluation of the results of a health service partnership between an Aboriginal community controlled health service, a hospital and a community health service in north-west Western Australia. INTERVENTION: Integration of health promotion, health assessments and chronic disease management with an acute primary health care service as a result of the formal partnership. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Cross-sectional data on use and outcomes of health care from 1 July 2006 to 30 June 2012 are reported in accordance with national key performance indicators. RESULTS: There were increases in occasions of service (from 21 218 to 33 753), most notably in primary health care services provided to very remote outlying communities (from 863 to 11 338). Health assessment uptake increased from 13% of the eligible population to 61%, leading to 73% of those identified with diabetes being placed on a care plan. Quality-of-care indicators (glycated haemoglobin checks and proportion of people with diabetics receiving antihypertensives) showed improvements over the 6-year study period, and there was also a downward trend in mortality. CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrates that strengthening primary health care services by addressing key enablers and sustainability requirements can translate into population health gains consistent with the goals underpinning the National Health Care Reform and Closing the Gap policies, and may potentially reduce health inequity for remote-living Aboriginal Australians.

Community participation in health service reform: the development of an innovative remote Aboriginal primary health-care service.

The aim of this study was to describe the reorientation of a remote primary health-care service, in the Kimberley region of Australia, its impact on access to services and the factors instrumental in bringing about change. A unique community-initiated health service partnership was developed between a community-controlled Aboriginal health organisation, a government hospital and a population health unit, in order to overcome the challenges of delivering primary health care to a dispersed, highly disadvantaged Aboriginal population in a very remote area. The shared goals and clear delineation of responsibilities achieved through the partnership reoriented an essentially acute hospital-based service to a prevention-focussed comprehensive primary health-care service, with a focus on systematic screening for chronic disease, interdisciplinary follow up, health promotion, community advocacy and primary prevention. This formal partnership enabled the primary health-care service to meet the major challenges of providing a sustainable, prevention-focussed service in a very remote and socially disadvantaged area.