Newsletter - Scottish Pathology Network

Scottish Pathology Network

Newsletter November 2017

Issue 4

Welcome to the Scottish Pathology Network autumn newsletter. This edition will summarise the work that SPAN has undertaken or been involved in during mid-late 2017.

SPAN’s first national event SPAN held its first national event on 3rd November at COSLA, Edinburgh. The aim of the event was to explore the current and future role of SPAN in achieving the best possible innovative, equitable, patient centred, high quality and clinically effective Pathology service. Over 140 delegates - including pathologists, biomedical scientists, managers, healthcare workers and representatives from Scottish Government - attended the event from across Scotland, in addition to delegates from NHS England, Wales and Northern Ireland (see overleaf) Presentations covered broad themes including strategic drivers, developments in pathology, sustainability, education and quality improvement.

The programme demonstrated the work SPAN has and is undertaking on behalf of NHS Scotland, as well as highlighting what new Pathology technologies are the horizon. Evaluation from the event showed the most popular presentations were ‘BMS Dissection: training our scientists’ and ‘Future Face of Pathology’. Comments included “excellent, very positive day” and “It is great for grass roots staff to get out and about, networking and hearing about plans”. Twitter activity was amazing with tweets reaching 13,600 people on the day. The presentation by Allan Wilson, SPAN’s Scientific Manager, generated the top tweet with 1072 people reached.

Attendees on the day—what organisations attended

Event rating—1 (poor) to 5 (excellent)

The SPAN event was a great success, bringing the pathology community together, and planning is underway for the next national event in November 2018! More information on the event can be found on SPAN’s website: http://www.pathology.scot.nhs.uk/ annual-event/

The strengths of the event gave rise to natural improvements, which build on good practice and good experience. Some suggestions for the next SPAN event include: 

Experiences from the BMS Dissection training school

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Experiences from other countries

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Further updates on digital pathology

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Update on HPV

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Fewer speakers

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Other career pathways aside from IBMS

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Potential separation of medical/ scientific talks

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Venue improvements such as no split screen, more ladies toilets, greater access to refreshments

If you have any suggestions on what you would like to hear about next year, please contact us!

SPAN workstreams BMS Dissection The BMS Dissection Implementation group has developed the final BMS Dissection Training School programme for May 2018. This is available here, along with the nomination form and learning agreement. Nominations are requested to be submitted by 22nd December to [email protected] The BMS Dissection Implementation Group next meets in early 2018 to review applications. The BMS Dissection Business Case will be presented to NHS Board Chief Executives in early 2018.

@NMDNScot Twitter followers— where our followers are based in Scotland

Horizon scanning The SPAN Horizon Scanning group meets on 14th December. Guest speakers have been invited to present on collaboration between Pathology and eHealth and developments in Genetics. The block and slide storage survey will be repeated in early 2018 to monitor current issues with storage.

Mortuary Group The SPAN Mortuary group next meets on 8th December to refine the Mortuary survey which will be circulated at the end of 2017. This will ascertain the current status of the Scottish Mortuary services.

Andrology Group The SPAN Andrology group met for the first time on 8th November, with good representation from across Scottish laboratories. There was the opportunity to share current issues relating to Andrology services. Participants completed a questionnaire and this will help plan Andrology services for the future.

Data Group The Data group will take place in early 2018. This group will refine the SPAN dataset for 2017-18.

SPAN Communications Strategy The SPAN Communications Strategy has been reviewed to ensure that we continue to engage with all our stakeholders. To see more, click here.

2016-17 saw the creation of the first Twitter account for the NMDNs, which is in line with all SPAN’s communication and engagement strategies. The account was used to share SPAN news and events in the public domain. SPAN tweeted a total of 131 times. These were viewed a total of 42,740 times. A snapshot of our 249 followers is shown above. SPAN also created a hashtag:

#pathologycommunity You can follow us on Twitter: @NMDNScot If you would like to become involved in SPAN, please do not hesitate to contact us!

Digital Pathology pilot The digital pathology pilot is underway in both GGC and Lothian. A scanner and server has been installed and tested on each sites. Work is near completion for LIMS integration. There has been a delay with debate as to how best to connect the servers to NHS infrastructure, in a way that complies with NHS Scotland IT security governance. After a series of meetings involving the project team, eHealth from both sites and Philips, a way forward has been agreed which will allow an efficient single workstation model. While this has been frustrating, it is a lesson learnt and the solution should be acceptable to all Boards following national roll out. User acceptance testing will start in GGC in December with full pilot commencing January 2018. The project team is planning a Scottish Digital Pathology Symposium, to be held in Spring 2018. Details to follow shortly.

Shared Services Distributed Service Model Design Group The second meeting of the Shared Services Distributed Services Model Design Group took place on 16th November. The blueprint for the future service model was presented by Dr Bill Bartlett. There will be a need for further engagement around this and it is hoped to share this with the networks shortly.

IT group Deliverables include a high-level spec for LIMS, recommendations for NPex implementation and costs for a datamart. There is agreement to move to realtime information rather than benchmarking and so a national datamart will also be a deliverable of this project. The Shared Services team are meeting with ISD to explore synergies with the radiology datamart, that had originally been developed by SCIN.

outlining the approach for a future model for data collection and making recommendations for the best way to take this forward. Discussion about data solutions and the blueprint will be ongoing between now and the next meeting on 20th December. The NNMS will support engagement with the networks. Laboratories shared service programme updates along with papers and team details can be found here

SPAN Quality & Performance reports SPAN has issued your individual Board reports to your Steering Group member. If you could please provide your feedback on this report (Page 18), including any mitigating factors and comments in response to the feedback from the core team to us at [email protected]. This will then be included to create a final version.

Upcoming surveys SPAN will be issuing the following surveys soon!:  Mortuary questionnaire  Block & slide storage questionnaire

Data group Keele benchmarking final reports are being worked up. Reports are not as granular as needed and do not provide sufficient information to inform the design of the DSM. IMS have provided the SPAN data and there is further potential for networks to deliver standardisation. A business case will be going forward in March

Quality Improvement support If you would like any support with Quality Improvement projects please contact us! We are happy to provide Quality Improvement tools and methodologies.

Get involved Further details can be found on the SPAN website: Or, contact us at

www.pathology.scot.nhs.uk

[email protected]

The National Managed Diagnostic Networks are on Twitter at @NMDNScot