NHS Sussex Community Musculoskeletal Services Shortlisted for the 2023 HSJ Awards

A ‘record-breaking’ 1456 entries have been received for this year’s Awards, with 223 projects and individuals reaching the final shortlist, making it the biggest awards programme in the award’s 43-year history. The high volume – and exceptional quality – of applications once again mirrors the impressive levels of innovation and care continually being developed within the UK’s healthcare networks.

Following the thorough judging process, NHS Sussex was shortlisted, ahead of the official awards ceremony to be held later this year (November 16th), with its standing out as a real ‘success story’ worthy of a prized place on the panel’s shortlist.

Musculoskeletal services represent the largest community service commissioned by NHS Sussex, with more than 100,000 patients using the services each year. The services are delivered across five provider organisations comprising of a large NHS community foundation trust, an integrated acute and community NHS trust, a social enterprise, a healthcare charity, and an NHS mental health foundation trust.

NHS Sussex entered the awards to showcase how their leadership and use of digital solutions can benefit patients and service providers on a large scale. Community Musculoskeletal Services implemented a digital solution to improve patient outcomes by better understanding patient needs and designing services accordingly. The project aims to share how successful collaboration with multiple providers is achieving better system value and significant service transformation.

This new approach has greatly improved services as prior to this programme each organisation monitored different demographic and quality datasets, meaning comparison and evaluation of optimal outcomes was impossible across the system.

In the first 12 months of data collection, the programme has collected over 20,000 unique survey responses from patients. This new automated way of monitoring data helps identify patients at greatest risk of health inequalities and poor population health outcomes sooner in their care experience. Targeted, personalised approaches to more timely care are currently under development to improve outcomes for these ‘at-risk’ patients.

Cemplicity CEO, Blaik Wilson, said:

It is wonderful to work with Matthew Carr and the team at NHS Sussex, and we’re thrilled to be shortlisted for the Data Driven Transformation HSJ Award. Seamless collection of patient reported data that enables a system wide view of MSK outcomes was a great first step. Enabling this data to drive equality, access, and digital transformation is a challenge we are readily accepting!”

HSJ editor Alastair McLellan, adds;

It always gives me great pleasure to congratulate our finalists at this stage of the judging process and this year is no exception as we acknowledge NHS Sussex for being shortlisted in the category of Data-Driven Transformation.

“It’s been so encouraging to hear that 2023 has been record-breaking in terms of the number of applicants and, as ever, the calibre of entries left our panel of expert judges with some tough decisions to deliberate over.

“However, it’s always important to remember that the HSJ Awards are not just a celebration of success stories but also a platform to shape the future of the NHS.

“We can’t wait to welcome our finalists to the awards ceremony in November and to recognise and applaud such impressive achievements across the sector – as well as coming together to help mark the 75th birthday of our great NHS. Huge thanks also go to our new headline partner, Vodafone, who share our mission of driving the standard of healthcare excellence and creating better patient experiences.”

The selected winners will be announced during the awards ceremony at Evolution London on November 16th 2023.

The event will not only reflect the HSJ Awards’ enduring ethos of “sharing best practice, improving patient outcomes and innovating drivers of better service” but will also serve as a timely and well-deserved thank you to the sector during the 75th anniversary year of the NHS.

The 2023 awards judging panel was once again made up of a diverse range of highly influential and respected figures within the healthcare community, including; Crystal Oldman, Chief Executive, Queen’s Nursing Institute; Dr Habib Naqvi MBE, Chief Executive, NHS Race and Health Observatory; Anne-Marie Vine-Lott, Director of Health, Vodafone; Sir Jim Mackey, National Director of Elective Recovery, NHS England, as well as a range of esteemed Chief Executives from NHS Trusts across the UK.

The full list of nominees for the 2023 HSJ awards can be found at https://awards.hsj.co.uk/ alongside details of the Awards partners at https://awards.hsj.co.uk/partners.

ENDS