The Safer Together Collaborative was officially launched on 22 August 2024 by NHS Forth Valley, Clacks and Stirling Health and Social Care Partnership, Falkirk Health and Social Care Partnership and the University of Stirling to focus on how the organisations can work together to create a safer healthcare environment.
The aim of the Forth Valley Safer Together Collaborative (STC) is to improve patient safety across several areas through clinical policy review and coordination of improvement support.
The STC will focus on identifying and addressing key areas of patient safety concern, pressure ulcers incidence, safer mobility and falls risk reduction, cardiac arrest and deteriorating patient, catheter care, and ageing and frailty. The high level aims of the collaborative include:
- Reduce grade 2-4 pressure ulcers by 30% by November 2025
- Reduce total falls and falls with Harm (moderate to severe) by 30% by November 2025
- Reduce enhanced observations by 50% by May 2025 (including a 50% reduction in cost by May 2025)
- Reduce Cardiac Arrest rate by 40% by November 2025 while improving cardiac arrest reporting via safeguard
- Reduce Catheter Usage by 30% by November 2025.
The STC will align the high level aims with current evidence-based standards and national improvement programmes mapped to our local priorities.
Teams from across all stakeholders will come together to learn from each other through four in-depth learning sessions over the next ten months.
The first session was held in November and brought together 112 healthcare professionals, service users, and quality improvement leaders to discuss strategies for enhancing healthcare services in NHS Forth Valley. The key takeaways from the day included:
- Collaboration is key – service users, staff and leadership working together is essential for sustainable change
- Feedback is a resource – complaints and reflections are valuable tools for driving improvement.
- Data-driven improvement – baseline data and system understanding are crucial for implementing effective interventions.
This session will be followed by a learning period to implement safety improvements and Learning Session 2 will be on Tuesday 18 March 2025 in the Lecture Theatre at FVRH.
