Swindon Clinical Commissioning Group

Swindon CCG plan and purchase around £300 million of healthcare services for the local community. It forms part of the Bath and North East Somerset, Swindon and Wiltshire Sustainability and Transformation Partnership (BSW STP) which includes 90 GP practices and serves a population of over 940 000.

They enlist the help of local people, GPs, hospital clinicians, voluntary organisations and local authorities, in all decision making.

The CCG’s objectives are to:

• increase the life expectancy of people living in Swindon and Shrivenham
• increase self-reliance
• support self-care
• reduce emergency admissions
• make the shift from unplanned to planned care

Using new technology is vital to achieving these objectives. It is used to improve efficiency and productivity, and to reduce inequality in health and care by making the same high-quality care accessible to patients regardless of location.

Swindon CCG chose MLL Telecom as its HSCN supplier and found them to be very supportive. They provided the flexible HSCN network solutions needed to meet Swindon’s local need and IT strategy.

MLL technical engineers were also on call to tackle any possible issues during each migration - which was an average of 15 minutes downtime per GP practice – resulting in minimum interruption to clinical care.

Following their successful implementation, Swindon CCG are now using the lessons they learned to support their partners across the BSW STP, such as Wiltshire CCG, with their HSCN migrations.

By migrating to HSCN, Swindon CCG have:

Increased network capacity and resilience

Network capacity has more than doubled for all GP practices, acting as an enabler for improved patient care and development of future digital services and contributing to better patient care and the development of new digital services.

Improved access to patients

The increase in network speed will enable GPs to speak to patients using video consultations in the near future. This will save travel time for clinicians, time that they can better use to provide clinical care for other patients.

Improved access to real-time clinical information

Clinicians can now use their devices for secure remote access into HSCN, which enables them to access and record clinical information at care homes and hospices, during home visits and in community settings. On N3 they would have to record this information from their office base. System and network issues often meant that these interactions wouldn’t update on the patient record until the following day, causing delays to diagnosis and treatment. With HSCN these patient records can be updated instantly, giving clinicians confidence that they have access to the data that underpins safe, effective and high-quality continued care to patients.

Developed cloud hosting and increased interoperability

HSCN has allowed Swindon CCG to develop their use of cloud hosting. With a single network for all 30 GP sites, network data can be shared, giving staff access one common user directory. Having one shared network across all practices increases collaboration within primary care, standardises cyber security across sites and reduces the amount of hardware within GP practices.

With HSCN, Swindon CCG don’t need to use the public internet to access Microsoft Azure, which enhances security.

Improved work-life balance for GPs

GPs now use HSCN for remote working, including access to electronic patient records on their secure laptops, to undertake reviews and repeat prescribing activities away from the GP Practice. This provides a better work-life balance to help retain a highly skilled workforce.

Integration with social services

Swindon CCG can now give local care homes and hospices access to shared care plans, including end of life care, and clinical information from SystmOne, their principal patient administration system.

Clinical staff responsible for delivering care to patients at hospices can view and interact with the NHS clinicians treating their patients, meaning patient care is more efficient and safer, with all relevant clinical staff members able to access accurate and reliable information.