We caught up with Luke Stockley, Operations and Performance Business Partner at Encompass Care, to find out how they have been using Nourish for their digital care management across their care service.
Has Nourish helped you enhance the quality of care at Encompass?
Absolutely, yes. From every level of user (from frontline support workers who input information, to first line managers who review and examine evidence to senior managers who analyse data and to executive decision makers), having a logical system that is easy to navigate on all levels, means important decisions can be made promptly and without delay. Planning, developing and monitoring care, with the person and their circle of support becomes easier with a system that frees up time for carers to deliver actual care and support. We can identify trends, assess risk, share records and implement change remotely and swiftly.
Would you say that Nourish has been easily scalable across all of your homes?
When I started my employment with Encompass the use of and engagement with Nourish was disproportionate across our 20 sites. To take what was working well and roll it out across the whole organisation took some time and a lot of effort, but the progress and improvement was evident quite quickly. Organisation Interactions has been extremely useful, we can take any form, create it as an interaction and allocate it to whichever services we choose.
A good example of this is the guidance for visitors & testing for care settings through Covid, which has changed regularly, sometimes with very little notice.
We support people in supported living, registered care homes, and in the community, all of which had different guidelines and standards for visitors. We created interactions for visiting/testing for each setting, and allocated the correct version to the appropriate setting. This reduced confusion for the frontline staff using the interactions, and when guidelines were updated, we could amend the interaction and not have to worry about previous versions of a paper form being used.
“Nourish is very versatile and we have found many innovative solutions to problems and is an extremely valuable tool when we are asked to monitor health conditions or behaviours” – Luke Stockley, Operations and Performance Business Partner at Encompass Care
How has Nourish helped you throughout the Covid-19 pandemic?
Nourish has played a huge part in keeping people safe in our services throughout the pandemic. The direct link to the services was removed when some managers and all senior managers had to work from home. To have all the information about the people we support, and the place they live accessible and live in one place has been invaluable and helped us to be proactive in our support delivery.
How have you personalised Nourish to meet the needs of Encompass?
Nourish is very versatile and we have found many innovative solutions to problems. We have set up an Important Communication for Staff profile in all our services, with and interaction scheduled on the timeline 00.01-23.59.
All memos, updates and important communication for our staff teams are uploaded as supporting documents and a message sent to all directing them to the interaction. This has been particularly useful through the pandemic, as guidance has changed regularly, with little notice.
We have also set up internal Quality Monitoring interactions, daily, weekly and monthly IPC audits, visitor testing, maintenance logs and many more.
How useful has Nourish been for community engagement? (for example, working with GP’s, the CQC, Hospitals and other third-party healthcare providers?)
Nourish is an extremely valuable tool when we are asked to monitor health conditions or behaviours, we can take a form given to us by a third-party healthcare provider, recreate it as an interaction and schedule it on the timeline. The data collected is clear, concise and accessible.
We can generate reports that can be easily shared. Information that used to be handwritten on paper, in a folder on a shelf in an office is now digital and accessible when needed.
