March 16, 2016 Industry news
Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trusts kick-starts the GS1 implementation programme
Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trusts, one of the largest in the country offering a wide range of both general and specialist hospital services and seeing over 1.5 million patients every year, is one of the NHS Acute Trusts chosen by the Department of Health to act as a demonstrator site of excellence for the use of GS1and PEPPOL standards. The Trust will receive support and a share of £12m to demonstrate the significant efficiencies, cost savings, reduced errors and improved patient outcomes and safety from using GS1 standards.
To kick off the GS1 implementation programme, we’ve opened a designated GS1 Project Office on-site and we’re closely working with the Trust to harness the potential of GS1 standards for patients and the taxpayer, and support them in developing best practice for procurement.
Tony Whitfield, Director of Finance at The Leeds Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, We are delighted to be working on this exciting project, which will enhance patient safety while enabling us to have a much greater overview of all the items we use every day to look after 1.5 million patients every year, reducing waste. It will mean that every location, medicine and medical device will be identified using a unique barcode which is also associated with a particular patient, providing additional monitoring for safety purposes. It will make it easier to track individual patient journeys through our hospitals and ensure we only order the stock we need at the time we need it, delivering significant cost savings. We also see the broader opportunities the adoption of standards bring in, supporting us to deliver year-on-year improvements to the way we design services to best meet the needs of our patients.”
Glen Hodgson, Head of Healthcare at GS1 UK, said: “We are excited to work with the Leeds team to support the leadership of the GS1 implementation project, ensure delivery of implementation against the defined timelines and greatly improve the quality and safety of care. We look forward to welcoming them at our upcoming healthcare conference where they’ll showcase their commitment in championing and driving forward the adoption of GS1 and PEPPOL standards.”
Leeds Teaching Hospitals is participating, along with other demonstrator sites, in our annual GS1 UK Healthcare Conference on 12-13 April 2016, where they’ll outline in detail what it means to be a GS1 demonstrator site and showcase the Leeds way when it comes to implementing GS1 standards.