Hillingdon Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust - clinical services strategy development

GGI was appointed by The Hillingdon Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust (THHT) to help the trust develop a strategic outline case (SOC) addressing all feasible options for the redevelopment of Hillingdon Hospitals.

An initial step was to develop the trust’s clinical services strategy (CSS) describing the clinical case for change and considering the scope, shape, and size of services required to meet the projected healthcare needs of the local population, and priorities in the short, medium and long term.

The programme was undertaken in three phases:

• Planning and preparation
  • Establishing the programme infrastructure and governance arrangements to provide the clinical framework, leadership and clinical assurance for the redevelopment programme.
  • Setting up eight working groups aligned to core clinical areas, with a membership comprising trust clinicians and local external partners, to drive the strategy development process for each area.
  • Preparing tailored briefing packs for all clinical working groups incorporating current activity data; forecast demographic growth; relevant local, regional and national context; current service performance against key indicators; benchmarking information; and emerging lines of enquiry.
• Clinical engagement and strategy development
  • Two GGI-facilitated workshops with each clinical working group to develop and then test a CSS for each clinical area.
  • Outputs reviewed by the CSS steering group that was responsible for overseeing the development of the strategy.
  • Finalisation of clinical service strategies and the development of enabling strategic plans.
• Write up, test and approval
  
  • Review of emerging position with the trust executive and board, tested with local external stakeholders and partners.
  • Drafting of full CSS and formal sign-off.

• Clear clinical requirements for the redevelopment, and an agreed direction of travel for the organisation, approved both by the trust board and external partners.
• A clinically led process, with engagement and buy-in from clinicians across the organisation and externally.
• Worked up scenarios and robust demand and capacity forecasts, agreed by external partners, to inform the next stages of the redevelopment programme.
• Ability to progress to the next stage of the process with a clear understanding of the strategic case for change. The new CSS was used to inform the development of more granular five-year specialty level strategies.