Case Studies

Swindon Borough Council has employed Robotic Process Automation (RPA) to improve processing efficiency, enhance the safeguarding of citizen data and manage high application volumes as part of its Free School Meals programme, resulting in a 66% reduction in application turnaround time for parents and carers. 

The challenges faced by Birmingham Community Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust (BCHC) during the COVID-19 pandemic have been wide-ranging. This is due to the large number of sites and over 4000 members of staff delivering well over 100 clinical services in a wide range of community settings. By utilising NDL's eForm technology, FX, the Trust has prioritised the safety of it's staff, managed and organised PPE supplies, and preserved thousands of crucial hours with the swift mobilisation of a COVID-19 Contingency Planning Hub. 

Following the merger of Staffordshire and Stoke-on-Trent Partnership NHS Foundation Trust and South Staffordshire and Shropshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust, the newly formed Midlands Partnership NHS Foundation Trust (MPFT) migrated 6.5 million up-to-date patient records from two seperate systems into one single instance. The process has saved a significant amount of time and money, as well as improved the integrity of the patient data in the Trust. 

Midlands Partnership NHS Foundation Trust has automated its document scanning process, clearing a back log of 40,000 physical documents as part of the new RPA process. The automation has reduced the process time from 4 minutes, to 1 minute – a time saving of 75% per document.

Medway Council has migrated 6 million records from an old documents system into a new one using RPA. The automation has resulted in a substantial cost and time saving for the Council, improving data integrity and accuracy in the process.

West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust has developed an application that aids capturing photographic records of wounds and other conditions in a clinical environment. The Trust was able to use a mobile workflow and automation to achieve a significant time saving and improved data accuracy, while also improving their CQC rating in the process.

Following the success of their Clinical Photography application, West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust saw an opportunity to implement the same technology in their Ophthalmology department. The application can take pictures of the back of patient’s eyes using an unmodified iPhone X, with a telephoto lens attached. As well as improving both the speed and quality of patient care, the Trust has also ensured a more accurate and secure patient database.

Warwickshire County Council has transformed multiple services within the organisation with mobile working. Learn how WCC took an agile approach to digital transformation, see the results and learn about its plans for the future. 

Following the success of its Child Immunisations eConsent programme, Hounslow And Richmond Community Healthcare NHS Trust implemented the paperless consent system for its staff immunisations. The expansion of the system has allowed the Trust to regain control of its process, saving time and money whilst achieving its highest staff immunisations uptake to date.

Hounslow and Richmond Community Healthcare NHS Trust achieves its highest uptake to date for child immunisations by taking its consent process paperless. The new system has allowed the Trust to improve data analysis, security and integrity – ultimately leading to improve efficiency and reduced waste.

University Hospitals of Morecambe Bay NHS Foundation Trust have implemented a mobile working solution to replace a labour intensive, paper-based process. The new Patient Meal Choices app is improving patient experience and quality of care in the Trust as well producing significant time and money savings by reducing waste. 

Warwickshire County Council has transformed its building inspections service by implementing a new mobile working app. The Condition Surveys app has replaced an admin heavy process that consumed a large amount of paper. Mobile working has improved data integrity, eliminated rekeying and reduced paper usage within the Council.

Nottinghamshire Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust is utilising mobile working on the wards of its secure mental health hospitals. The Trust's new Observation app, developed on NDL's MX, improves the level of care given through real-time data available to clinician on the go. The app has resulted in improved appointment time keeping, greater data accuracy and reduced clinical risk.

Newcastle City Council improves social worker services and staff safety with a new Visits Mobile Working App. The new app, developed using MX, includes several features which improve communication, timekeeping, staff safeguarding and data security. The app is also fully integrated with the back-office system, allowing social workers to spend less time rekeying and more time on frontline care.

Clinicians at Manchester Mental Health and Social Care NHS Trust often work flexibly within the community. Although patient records were digitised, there was no way for staff to access and update this information remotely. Using NDL's mobile working toolkit, MX, the Trust implemented a mobile application to over 250 users citywide, saving them valuable clinician time and improving service delivery. 

Medway Council has saved over £14 million and improved customer service through ‘Better for Less’, a significant transformation programme. It is now handling all calls in one customer contact centre and has supported this through integration between Lagan CRM, Idox EDRMS and a number of back-office systems. A key element of its integration hub is awi SX and awi QX, NDL’s integration technology toolkit, which for one integration alone saved £85,000 capital costs as well as driving significant efficiencies.

Surrey County Council has significantly improved the accuracy of its data on vulnerable children in its care and the timeliness of updates. In particular Surrey has received the highest data quality confidence levels in the country for the annual Department for Education Children in Need census. This has been achieved by using NDL’s awi SX application integration platform to integrate and extract data from its Liquidlogic Children’s Social Care system and Capita ONE education management system. Further integrations into ONE to replace manual changes on children enrolled into its Virtual School cohort (4–19 yrs) are also taking place.

Abertawe Bro Morgannwg University Health Board has implemented an innovative integration solution to improve patient care. The solution integrates electronic patient information between the national Patient Administration System, Myrddin, and the ABMU developed Clinical Portal. By keeping the two systems synchronised, patient information is more accurate and discharge planning can be undertaken more effectively.

North Hertfordshire Homes has saved hundreds of hours of back-office time and reduced by two months the surveying period for its annual repairs programme by introducing mobile working. Its building surveyors are now using MX when they inspect properties, eliminating paper forms and enabling automatic transfer of reports into the back-office QL housing management system.

Newcastle City Council identified that social workers’ time was being wasted carrying out repetitive duplicate data entry. It therefore used awi^SX, NDL’s integration server technology, to integrate two back-office systems, which has automated this transfer of data. As a result, it has saved 375 working days a year which equates to a saving over three years of approximately £230,000. It is now using the awi suite across a range of integration projects, eliminating wasteful data entry and automating laborious processes.

To meet the dual aims of cutting costs and improving services, Stroud District Council selected awi, NDL’s integration suite, to underpin three initial projects. Once these had proved to be successful, it then extended awi’s use across the planning, environmental health and housing departments, where it is helping to eliminate re-keying, provide better customer services, improve data quality and transform working practices.

Norwich City Council wanted to introduce SMS alerts but was prevented from doing this by inconsistent data across back-office systems and the CRM. It decided to use awi SX, NDL’s integration software development toolkit, to verify and synchronise mobile telephone numbers across all systems, enabling it to implement its first alert service. This integration programme is now being extended to cover other key data across the Council, resulting in significantly improved data and reducing wasteful manual look-ups and data entry.

West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust faced a number of integration challenges, particularly with its iExpress Patient Administration System. It has now selected awi, NDL’s integration suite, to overcome these. The first project used awi to enable automatic updates between new outpatient check-in kiosks and iExpress. The Trust then used the toolkit to integrate its Aria chemotherapy e-prescribing system with the Somerset Cancer Register, enabling it to meet the latest stringent government requirements for data submission. West Suffolk now plans to use awi to support more integration and mobile working projects.

For each road maintenance job or emergency call out carried out by one of its teams, Amey UK has to produce Safe Dig Packs, giving details of utility supplies in the area. Previously this was a laborious manual process. Now, using NDL's awi integration toolkit, it has automated the process of how these are produced, which has resulted in a cost saving of £240,000 a year. This has also enabled a more timely response to emergency repair requests and has improved management information.

West Kent Housing Association had successfully implemented an out-of-hours asbestos warning system for its responsive repairs team using awi MX, NDL’s mobile technology. It has now moved on to a more comprehensive mobile working project, which includes repairs requests, job scheduling, asbestos alerts and gas certification, all integrated seamlessly with its back-office systems. As a result, it is making significant cost savings as well as improving efficiency, productivity and management information.

Bolton Council selected MX, NDL’s mobile solution, as its corporate mobile platform. It has successfully mobilised a number of services within its Environment and Planning departments, which has already resulted in an estimated yearly saving of £60,000. It has now used MX to create a mobile app for its new extended recycling scheme, supporting the delivery and removal of bins. As a result, it is saving approximately £10,000 per year.

As part of a major transformation programme, Medway Council initiated a project to handle all calls in its customer contact centre. To support this, it selected awi, NDL’s integration technology, to link between the front-office CRM and a number of back-office systems. Through one integration alone, it saved £85,000 in capital costs as well as driving significant efficiencies. It has now extended its programme of integration, and it is also starting to implement mobile working using NDL’s mobile technology, enabling officers to spend more time in the field.

South Norfolk Council embarked on a ‘lean’ service review, which highlighted three areas for improvement: to integrate disparate systems, to implement more self-service and to bring more services into a central contact centre. To do this, the Council is using awi, NDL’s integration technology, to underpin a wide range of integration projects. It is rolling the solution out widely, supporting both improved service delivery and one-off data integrity projects. As a result it has considerably exceeded its target for time saved and will more than recoup its investment in less than 12 months.

East Lancashire Hospitals NHS Trust needed to eliminate wasteful duplicated data entry as well as ensuring its central Patient Administration System (PAS) was more accurate and up-to-date. To do this, it needed to integrate a number of systems with the PAS. It has used awi, NDL’s integration technology, to carry this out and, as a result, it has been able to divert staff time to more productive tasks, patients are tracked more stringently and data is entered more accurately and in real time.

Argyll and Bute Council launched a major initiative to improve customer service through system integration. It has already successfully completed an integration project for social services, using awi from NDL to link its front-office Lagan CRM with its CareFirst social work system. It has now moved on to environmental health, using awi again to integrate the front office with its back-office Idox Uniform application. As a result, it has saved the equivalent of one FTE, improved customer service and streamlined front-office processes.

As part of a four-year project to improve customer contact, Argyll and Bute Council needed to integrate existing back-office applications with its front-office CRM system. To do this, it selected awi, NDL’s integration suite, as its corporate integration tool. Phase one comprised linking its existing CareFirst social work application to the CRM used by its customer service employees; it has extended this further and is about to launch phase two, which will enable staff in the customer service centre to take social work referrals. As a result, it estimates it is saving £110,000 a year. It is now embarking on further integration projects.

Stevenage Borough Council wanted to improve the way customers could report environmental nuisances, and in particular to eliminate duplicate reports. By using awi from NDL to integrate between Fix My Street, an online reporting facility, and the front-office CRM, customers and staff are now able to view the most up-to-date information on all logged incidents and updates. This has reduced duplication and avoidable contacts, decreased manual re-keying and enhanced customer communications.

As part of a review to identify potential service improvements and financial efficiencies, The Moray Council recently set up a central customer contact centre. The programme then involved different services transferring initial customer contact to this one central point. One of the first services to migrate was its Housing Repairs service and, at the same time, it implemented mobile working for its housing repairs operatives. By using awi^MX and awi^SX, NDL’s mobile and integration technology, it has now integrated both its front-office CRM and three back-office systems to support the new way of working. As a result, it has realised significant efficiencies and cost-savings.

Informatics Merseyside is an NHS IM&T shared service, working with healthcare trusts across the Merseyside area to support and improve the quality of care delivered to patients. In particular, its aims align with the Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention (QIPP) agenda of improving the quality of care within the NHS while also achieving significant cost savings.

Blackpool Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust Community Health Services needed to reduce the amount of time wasted by clinicians through re-keying data into different systems. It identified awi from NDL as the best way of integrating disparate systems across the Trust. Once it started working with awi, it discovered a plethora of different ways to save time and money while still maintaining service standards.

As part of a business transformation programme, Scottish Borders wanted to rationalise its contact centres, bringing all services under one roof in each major town. To do this, it needed to integrate the front office with back-office applications. It is now using NDL’s awi integration technology to enable instant access to the environmental services application, gathering information using simple e-forms and taking payments. Benefits include bringing the recycling helpline in-house, improving services to citizens and saving £30,000 a year on external contracts.