During the COVID pandemic, the pressures on endocrine healthcare services in the UK were highlighted in the national Getting It Right First Time (GIRFT) report on endocrinology and the Society’s Defining the Future of Endocrinology document. Key challenges included long waiting times for clinic appointments, increasing referrals, a concern about clinical risk, and a static or declining workforce.

Last autumn, the Implementation Working Group within the Society for Endocrinology’s Clinical Committee circulated a questionnaire to all members of the Society, to explore implementation of the recommendations from these reports.

The intention was to understand the pressures that our members were facing on their services, and their priorities. The 320 responses showed wide variation in practice and innovation to adapt to pressures in endocrine services, both before and after the COVID pandemic.

The Recovery and Transformation agenda in England was being rolled out to cope with the clinical backlog following the pandemic, with similar initiatives in the other nations. However, many responses showed that members remained concerned about their services, and wanted advice on how to make further clinically appropriate changes.

THE OUTCOMES

The Implementation Working Group is now a significant part of the Clinical Committee’s agenda, with clinical services discussed at every meeting. We are working with NHS England and GIRFT to ensure that these bodies are fully informed of best practice by the Clinical Committee and the Clinical Reference Group, ensuring that innovation is not stifled.

The Society has expanded and launched the Clinical Resource Hub, with additional materials to support business planning, exemplars of new ways of working and useful documentation around referral assessment and patient-initiated follow-up (PIFU).

Following the first successful webinar in September last year, we now have a full programme of Bitesize webinars running throughout 2023 and discussing clinic transformation themes. These include insights from clinical colleagues who have made positive changes to their services.

We also discovered that many services had endocrine specialist nurses to help with the workload, far more than were members of the Society. A questionnaire is now being developed to address the specific needs of this group.

SUGGESTIONS

If you have more examples of service change, or requirements for documentation and/or guidance which are not available currently on the Clinical Resource Hub, please contact [email protected].

DOUGLAS ROBERTSON
Associate Medical Director, Mid Cheshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
Chair, Defining the Future of Endocrinology Implementation Working Group Member, Society for Endocrinology Clinical Committee