Nuffield Health named as a quality data provider
The National Joint Registry (NJR) has named Nuffield Health as a Quality Data Provider after demonstrating high standards towards patient safety.
This is the first time the charity has received the award for all 30 hospitals across England and Wales.
The award recognises and rewards best practice through the attainment of six ambitious targets.
NJR monitors the performance of hip, knee, ankle, elbow and shoulder joint replacement operations to improve clinical outcomes primarily for the benefit of patients, but also to support orthopaedic clinicians and industry manufacturers.
It collects high-quality orthopaedic data to provide evidence to support patient safety, standards in quality of care and overall cost-effectiveness in joint replacement surgery.
Certificate scheme
The ‘NJR Quality Data Provider’ certificate scheme was introduced to offer hospitals a blueprint for reaching high-quality standards relating to patient safety and to reward those who have met registry targets.
Nuffield Health was required to meet a series of six targets during the audit period 2019-20.
These included compliance with the NJR’s mandatory national audit, aimed at assessing data completeness and quality within the registry, having a high level of patients consenting for their details to be included in the registry and demonstrating timely responses to any alerts issued by the NJR in relation to patient safety concerns, if necessary
To meet these targets, Nuffield Health improved its previous auditing process, such as handing the audit centrally to avoid delays. It also increased central support through the implementation of a ‘gatekeeper’ who acted as a contact for the NJR, allowing queries, errors and issues to be resolved more quickly.
The NJR Data Quality Audit investigates the accurate number of joint replacement procedures submitted to the registry compared to the number carried out and recorded in the local hospital patient administration system.
It ensures the NJR is collecting and reporting upon the most complete, accurate data possible across all hospitals performing joint replacement operations.
National Joint Registry medical director Mr Tim Wilton, said: ‘Registry data now provides an important source of evidence for regulators, such as the Care Quality Commission, to inform their judgements about services, as well as being a fundamental driver to inform improved quality of care for patients.’
Full details about the NJR’s Quality Data Provider certificate scheme can be found at https://www.njrcentre.org.uk.
- See ‘Sharing outcomes’