Second learning session held for Connecting Care: Improving service transitions
The second learning session for Connecting Care: Improving service transitions/Te tūhono i ngā manaakitanga, te whakapai ake i ngā whakawhitinga ratonga was held in Auckland on 7 August and Wellington on 8 August. Connecting Care is one of the five priority areas that comprises the national five-year mental health and addiction (MHA) quality improvement programme hosted by the Health Quality & Safety Commission. The supra-regional workshops were attended by 90 people over the two days with representatives from 18 district health boards (DHBs), as well as non-governmental organisations (NGOs), primary care, partner organisations and Commission staff.
Participants at the Connecting Care learning session
The learning session was an opportunity for participating Connecting Care project teams to meet with the MHA quality improvement programme team and collaborate to learn more about ideas for change including: how to implement changes; an approach for accelerating improvement; and a method for overcoming obstacles to change. Teams left the meeting with new knowledge, skills and materials to prepare them to make immediate changes. Teams were encouraged to keep a focus on equity and consumer, family and whānau involvement as part of their project work. Also, to look at what their data is telling them about their different populations and what they are going to do differently in order to address these issues.
Guest presenters included Leigh Murray, Family Advisor at Auckland DHB and Leilani Maraku, Chief Executive Officer at Mana ō te Tangata Trust. A member of the MHA quality improvement programme consumer advisory group presented at the Auckland and Wellington sessions respectively on the consumer, family and whānau experience of a transition. Joanne Henare, Whānau Ora Kaitautoko at MidCentral DHB and a member of the MHA quality improvement programme Māori advisory group spoke on equity issues. Janice Bowers, Clinical Nurse Manager, and Liz Turner, Clinical Coordinator at the Infant Child Adolescent Mental Health and Addiction Service (MHAS) at Whanganui DHB, presented their experience of improving the transition pathway and the development of Whanganui DHB’s MHAS transition and risk assessment plan.
The participating project teams will next meet to share their progress and learning at the final national learning session for this priority area in Wellington on 4 December 2019. In the meantime, monthly coaching sessions will support the teams in action period 2 (August to December) on topics such as plan-do-study-act cycles, maintaining momentum, and achieving spread and sustainability.
View copies of the presentations from this session below.