Quality Improvement

The DAPS Global Quality Improvement Program has been running since 2009. It was started by the head of DAPS Global, Imran Qureshi, after he had the privilege of attending the International Forum on Quality and Safety in Berlin. Having been exposed to improvement methodology, he setup DAPS to encourage and empower his colleagues to improve patient care within their own clinical environments and they have been doing exactly that.

The concept behind this is based on the idea that the people who are in direct contact with the vast majority of people and systems in healthcare are junior staff. As they are the ones who are working at the clinical chalkface, they are in a unique position to be able to see the multitude of issues with systems and where potential failures are. These failures inevitably harm patients and it is this harm that the quality improvement projects seek to minimise and ultimately eradicate. All junior doctors who are involved in the projects are given the choice over which area of patient care they are keen to improve. The reason behind this is that if they have ownership over this choice, they are more likely to both develop an optimal solution and complete the project. One of the main challenges for junior doctor quality improvement projects is the lack of protected time in which to carry out these projects. Junior doctors are expected to carry them out in their own time which often translates into projects not being completed on time or not at all in some cases.

The DAPS Quality Improvement Program was launched at Ashford & St Peters NHS Foundation Trust at the beginning of 2009 and since then has spread to other hospitals, including Croydon University Hospital, St Georges Hospital NHS Foundation Trust and is being established at the Princess Royal. The Program was also established in hospitals in Brisbane Australia with additional interest from hospitals in the Middle East and Pakistan.

DAPS Global Quality Improvement Projects

Here are a some examples of work which has been undertaken by junior healthcare professionals and students under the auspices of DAPS Global

1. Gentamicin Prescribing – Dr Imran Qureshi [Video | Publication]

2. Gentamicin Level Form – Drs Claire Garrett, Jonathon Hughes & Dominic Reynish

3. Improving Chest X-Ray Requests – Dr Rhiannyd Williams

4. Improving Understanding of Nutrition – Dr Claire Grew

5. Psychiatric Inpatient Observations – Dr Ayaaz Farhat

6. Improving Colorectal Surgical Site Infection – Dr Rebecca Curtis

7. Summary Sheet Cardiology – Dr Naziha Khawaja

8. Surgical Handover – Drs Matt Boardman & Dr Ana Borges

9. Neonatal Blood Gas Monitoring – Drs Noor Kafil-Hussain, Alice Booker & Caroline Gribbon

10. Discharge Medications for Illiterate Patients – Drs Matt Clayton, Umer Fayyaz, Faizan Syed & Amjid Rashid

11. Hand Hygiene & Re-use of Oxygen Masks – Drs Erum Khan, Josie Cashman, Nedah Darabi, Sana Aslam & Mehwish Gul Ijaz

12. Improving Use of Resuscitation Trollies – Drs Farhan Bashir, Graham MacKenzie, Mohsin Hussain, Seher Naeem and Ms Saba Sheikh

13. Medication Tracker – Drs Clare Davies, Rachel Dunbar & Maria Nyekiova

14. Improved & Informed – Drs Emma Roche, Sophie Broome, Olivia Curtis & Mark Williamson

15. Improving Care of Parkinson’s Patients – Drs Edmund Chan & Renay Sathybabo

16. Methotrexate Monitoring in Paediatrics – Drs Edmund Chan & Renay Sathybabo

17. Awareness of Penicillin Allergy – Dr Kayur Patel

18. Summary Sheet (Surgery) – Ms Dana Ali

19. Summary Sheet (Medicine) – Mr Shyamal Patel

20. Surgical Weekend Handover – Drs Rachel O’Connell, Nizar Din & Shahrzad Ghaderi

21. Teaching Students Handover – Dr Edward Palmer

22. Sliding Scale Monitoring – Drs Ben Collard & Shabbar Asharia

23. Monitoring Thromboprophylaxis – Mr Errol Reilly

24. Documenting Nature of Antibiotic Allergy – Ms Jafrin Matin

25. Improving Patient Follow-up Arrangements – Dr Katie Wimble

26. Improving On-call Bleeps – Drs Lulia Al-Hillawi, Leila Kafaei & Marie Brochut

27. Improving X-Ray Requests – Dr Ramanan Rajakalasingam

28. Improving Compliance with NG Tube Guidance – Dr Tia Hunjan

29. Dr-Toolbox – Drs Will Barker & Ed Mew

30. Neonatal Bilirubin Monitoring – Drs Will Barker, Lindsay Rae & Joanne Hayter

31. Paediatric Fluid Calculations – Drs Will Barker, Lindsay Rae & Joanne Hayter

32. Improving Locating Equipment – Dr Ryan Pedley

33. The use of ID Cards to help patients identify their doctors – Drs Liana Zucco, Gabby Desmond & Bernie Carpenter

34. Improving the GICU Daily Review – Drs Liana Zucco & Carly Webb

35. Reducing the risk of needle stick injuries to people in hospital – Drs James Denny & Anna Whitehouse

36. Improving patients’ experience at night – Dr John McGuiness