News & Updates
QI Essentials: More than a set of tools…
11 August 2020
There’s no doubt that quality improvement employs a large set of tools – driver diagrams, statistical process control charts, Pareto charts, force field diagrams, cause and effect diagrams, PDSA cycles, affinity diagrams, flow charts… The list could go on and on. Indeed, one of the comforts that quality improvement brings is the chance to build… Read More

My Experience Of Being Virtually Recruited During Lockdown
7 August 2020
By Samina Aklas,Trainee Data Analyst, Quality Improvement Team It is always an exciting, but nerve-racking experience when starting a new job. Adapting to an unfamiliar environment, and meeting new colleagues is hard. It’s even harder during a global pandemic, where there have been unprecedented changes in many areas. I strongly believe that things happen for a reason. As it was still lockdown, I went through the whole recruitment process at… Read More

Tech Champions – Supporting the Quality Improvement Department with New and Existing Technology
5 August 2020
Figure 1. Tech Champions in the Quality Improvement Department testing new and innovative ways of doing things.In early 2020 not everybody in the Quality Improvement Department was up to speed with the latest software and technology that was available to us. This was exacerbated when the Covid-19 lockdown began, and we needed to find new… Read More

How I have improved my garden and wellbeing during lockdown
8 June 2020
By Tim Gill, QI Programme Manager In recent years I’ve been trying to make the most of my garden, aiming for a pleasant place to relax and some extra benefits of home grown produce! This photo was taken in June 2018 and it seems I had some potatoes in progress and what looks like young courgette plants in the trough. … Read More

Virtual Carers’ Event
18 May 2020
Applause for the Forensic Service The Forensic directorate are delighted to have started hosting virtual carers’ events using a virtual video conferencing platform. Carers had been anxious to hear how staff were managing the COVID19 outbreak and what impact it had had on the care for their loved ones. There have been two online events… Read More

Introducing the ELFT Working Well Handy Guide
13 May 2020
The Working Well Handy Guide has been developed to provide a practical bite-sized resource to help support individuals and teams build satisfaction and wellbeing using a Quality Improvement (QI) approach. This is an ELFT resource that takes learning we have gained from supporting over 40 Enjoying Work project teams over the past 4 years. This… Read More

ELFT supporting ‘Fast Track Cities’ HIV prevention improvement collaborative
27 April 2020
by Marco Aurelio (Improvement Advisor) and Katherine Brittin (Associate Director of Quality Improvement) In 2016, for the first time in London, all the United Nations 90:90:90 targets (figure 1) were met. London is only one of three cities globally to achieve this. Despite this great progress, 43% of all new HIV diagnoses in England are… Read More

How the Data Team from QI have been supporting ELFT during COVID-19
27 April 2020
By Akkash Purani, Senior Improvement Data Analyst COVID-19 has caused us all to adapt in one way or another, and QI’s Data Team is no different. We’ve been helping to support ELFT during COVID-19. Forid Alom (Head of Improvement Analytics) and I have been, and continue to be, involved in a range of activities to… Read More

The Quality Assurance Team’s Experience of Recruiting Virtually
24 April 2020
On Wednesday 1st and Thursday 2nd April the Quality Assurance team followed in the footsteps of the Quality Improvement team in conducting our first set of virtual assessment centre and virtual interviews for 3 new staff members. We took a slightly different approach with Quality Assurance Manager Selina testing Webex and Quality Assurance Manager Ellie testing… Read More

Supporting Infection Prevention and Control webinars
23 April 2020
If you’ve been following our stories recently you will have seen that the QI Department have shared our learning on virtual working and our experience of running virtual learning events. During April we have been able to bring this experience to support colleagues in the Infection Prevention and Control team with a series of daily… Read More

Enabling Visualisation of our COVID-19 Data
23 April 2020
By Forid Alom, Head of Improvement Analytics Is data the new oil? A common analogy we hear, especially within Health Care. Whether this is true or not, there is no doubt data, in particular data visualisation, is crucial to decision making. Combine this improvement methodology and you’ve got yourself a powerful system. Throughout the trust,… Read More

Psst….Positive Gossip
22 April 2020
The Luton and Bedfordshire Senior Psychological Therapies team tested ‘positive gossip’ as part of their Enjoying Work project. The team was feeling very stretched and wanted a creative way to support each other. Two types of communication were included in the definition of ‘positive gossip’: Saying something positive about somebody to someone else, e.g. about… Read More

Continuing Improvement in Forensics
14 April 2020
By Nicola Ballingall, Improvement Advisor, Forensics Directorate Building on the story we recently shared from Morrison Ward at the John Howard Centre about how they are sharing good practice with each other during the COVID-19 crisis, find out how QI coaches are using improvement tools across the Forensics Directorate. Despite all the changes and challenges… Read More

Morrison Ward’s Daily Improvements during COVID-19
1 April 2020
The wards at the John Howard Centre, in our Forensics Service, are making sure to share good practice with each other during the COVID-19 crisis. For example, they’re all planning ahead in partnership with service users to find out what meaningful activities people would want if they were to be isolated. They’re hearing about skills… Read More

QI data team ‘tests’ virtual assessment centre & interviews
1 April 2020
As with other areas in the trust we must rapidly adapt to the current situation. So, on Wednesday 25th March the QI department conducted our first virtual assessment centre and virtual interviews. Applying improvement methodology enabled learning from this experience, important not only for the department but also the whole trust. Our theory was that we… Read More

Quality Improvement Department ‘tests’ virtual Pocket QI training
30 March 2020
During March we have all been presented with many differing challenges, one such challenge for the QI Department was to explore how we continue to build skills for QI within ELFT during such a challenging time. As with other areas in the trust we must rapidly adapt to the current situation. So, on the… Read More

QI/QA Department ‘tests’ remote working
23 March 2020
On Friday the 13th March (was that a sign?) we conducted our first ‘test’ of total remote working. Little did we know then that this way of working would quickly become the norm for millions of workers across the globe. It became apparent that we would need to do a longer test. So, based on… Read More

Congratulations to the latest Improvement Leaders!
4 March 2020
On Tuesday 3rd March the ninth Wave of the Improvement Leaders’ Programme (ILP, formally ISIA) and third Cohort of Enjoying Work came to a close with a graduation and celebration event. Since September 2019 around 140 staff, service users and carers have participated in 8 workshops designed to equip them with the tools and knowledge… Read More

IHI Annual visit 2019 – Highlights and Progress
20 November 2019
This October we were delighted to welcome our partners from the IHI to The Trust for their annual three day visit. This was the 6th annual IHI visit. This year we welcomed Derek Feeley, President and CEO, Trissa Torres, Chief Operations Officer and Pedro Delgado, Head of Europe and Latin America to The Trust … Read More

Annual IHI visit to ELFT
14 November 2019
From Monday 28th to Wednesday 30th October we are delighted to welcome our partners from IHI to the Trust for a three day visit. This is the sixth time the IHI team have joined us for an annual visit. This year we’re pleased to welcome Derek Feeley, Pedro Delgado and Trissa Torres and look forward… Read More
