High impact actions: Eight ways to boost quality

The High Impact Actions were announced by CNO Christine Beasley at the CNO conference on 11 November and published by the NHS Institute for Innovation and Improvement.

The work to agree the actions saw more than 600 nurses and midwives come forward with changes that have had
the most effect in their practices.

The final eight themes were chosen by a panel of chief nurses, their deputies, midwives, mental health specialists, hospital and community nurses and nurse/midwife champions from each SHA. ‘How-to’ guides are now planned
for each theme to help nurses and midwives implement them.

Katherine Fenton, Chief Nurse at South Central SHA, says: ‘To receive 600 responses in just over three weeks demonstrates the passion and dedication of nurses and midwives and the huge contribution they make, as the largest staff group in the NHS, to quality and productivity in the NHS.’

The actions in full

• Your skin matters: preventing avoidable pressure ulcers in NHS provided care
• Staying safe- preventing falls: achieving year-on-year reductions in falls among older people in NHS-provided care
• Keeping nourished - getting better: stopping inappropriate weight loss and dehydration in NHS provided care
• Promoting normal birth: letting midwives take the lead role in normal pregnancies and labour to eliminate unnecessary caesarian births
• Important choices - where to die when the time comes: avoiding inappropriate hospital admission and giving more people the choice of where they die
• Fit and well to care: reducing sickness absence among nurses and midwives - aiming for no more than
  three percent
• Ready to go - no delays: letting nurses and midwives manage and lead patient discharges where appropriate
  Protection from - infection: reducing urinary tract infections for patients in NHS. provided care.

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