Papworth Hospital

About

Papworth Hospital NHS Foundation Trust is one of the UK’s leading specialist centres for the diagnosis and treatment of heart and lung disease, treating over 20,000 inpatient and day cases and almost 30,000 outpatients each year from across the UK.

It has established a reputation for innovation and leading edge research and carried out the UK’s first successful heart transplant in 1979, followed by Europe’s first successful heart and lung transplant in 1984 and the world’s first heart, lung and liver transplant in 1986.

Papworth also has one of the UK’s leading Sleep Clinics which was featured recently in an 8 part BBC documentary.  In the most recent inpatient survey of acute Trusts, Papworthwas voted one of the top three NHS hospitals by patients for quality of care.

Challenge

In an increasingly risk aware environment, Business Continuity Management (BCM) is an important component of strategic planning for all organisations on the front line of public service delivery.

Major high-profile events like terrorist attacks, flu epidemics and natural disasters all push business continuity and emergency planning to the forefront of people's minds. But when they drop out of the news and things return to normal, some organisations still find themselves being caught out through more mundane but potentially damaging incidents such as technical failure or loss of key staff or premises.

These events emphasise the need for organisations to integrate business
continuity and risk management into their corporate strategy to minimise disruption to the public and staff in difficult times and protect the organisation’s reputation.

The Civil Contingencies Act (CCA), which became law on 18 November 2004, requires Category 1 responders such as NHS Trusts to make certain that they have effective BCM arrangements including Business Continuity Plans (BCPs) in place. These must ensure that the organisation can continue to provide its essential services in an emergency situation or disaster.

Prior to the CCA, although Papworth Hospital had some contingency arrangements in place, the majority were informal and undocumented as they had been developed on an ad-hoc basis by individual departments within the Hospital. The Hospital’s management therefore instigated a thorough BCM review.

“We wanted to ensure that we had an effective and robust business continuity structure in place so that we can continue to provide our critical services in any eventuality and meet our obligations under the CCA,” commented Claire Tripp, Director Nursing, Papworth Hospital. “We also wanted consistency across the whole Trust, to make things more straightforward in times of crisis.”

Solution

When reviewing the marketplace for a possible business continuity partner, the Trust chose IT assurance consultancy NCC Group for a helping hand.

NCC Group has extensive experience in preparing many public and private sector organisations for a range of eventualities, enabling them to withstand periods of interrupted operation, avoiding loss of business and customer confidence.

“Embedding business continuity into the core of all operations is the key to ensuring a fully resilient organisation,” commented Nathan Jackson, Director of Assurance Consultancy, NCC Group. “If organisations are to maintain ‘business as usual’ at all times they need to have a 'living and breathing' business continuity plan - that is regularly reviewed, audited and updated to ensure it continues to provide the appropriate levels of protection.”

NCC Group was commissioned to carry out a Business Impact Analysis (BIA) of the current situation against the standards developed by the Business Continuity Institute (BCI), provide guidance on the appropriateness of current plans and make recommendations on how to ensure its strategy was in line with the CCA moving forward.

A wide range of criteria was taken into account including; relationships with other departments, agencies and Trusts, legal and regulatory issues, minimum recovery requirements and current disaster recovery information. Discussions were carried out with all key staff ranging from the Chief Executive to the Pathology Services Manager.

Results

Jackson commented: “The Trust’s approach to BCM was emerging, we didn’t have to start from scratch but we needed to bring some form of uniformity to the whole process to ensure that the hospital could continue to go about its business, so far as is reasonably practicable in a crisis situation.”

Making BCM an integral part of strategic and day to day management has helped to instil a BCM culture across the organisation, with supporting vision statements and formal defined policies.

To ensure that the strategy continues to fit the Trust moving forward, there are processes in place to ensure that it is reviewed, tested and amended appropriately on a regular basis.

Tripp concluded: “Adopting the recommendations and action plan drawn up by NCC Group’s consultants has ensured that Papworth Hospital has an effective and robust BCM regime in place that is aligned with current best practice and meets the legislative requirements.”

Quote

“Adopting the recommendations and action plan drawn up by NCC Group’s consultants has ensured that Papworth Hospital has an effective and robust BCM regime in place that is aligned with current best practice and meets the legislative requirements.”

Claire Tripp, Director of Nursing, Papworth Hospital

Challenge

The Civil Contingencies Act (CCA), requires NHS Trusts to have effective Business Continuity Management (BCM) arrangements in place, to ensure that the organisation can continue to provide its essential services in an emergency situation or disaster

Although Papworth Hospital had some contingency arrangements in place, the majority were informal and undocumented as they had been developed on an ad-hoc basis by individual departments within the hospital

Solution

NCC Group advised Papworth Hospital on Business Continuity Management (BCM)

NCC Group carried out a Business Impact Analysis (BIA) of the current situation against the standards developed by the Business Continuity Institute (BCI) and made recommendations on how to ensure its strategy was in line with the CCA moving forward

Results

Papworth Hospital now has an effective and robust business continuity structure in place so that it can continue to provide its critical services in any eventuality and meet its obligations under the Civil Contingencies Act (CCA)