Chamber and committees

I can confirm that from 14 August 2020, the automated, web based Turas Care Management safety huddle tool will go live across Scotland. Data collection from the tool will commence from the week beginning 17 August 2020. I expect all care homes to be registered and using the automated safety huddle tool by 24 August.

The original Excel version of the safety huddle template was developed with the care home sector and other key stakeholders including representatives from the Care Inspectorate, Health and Social Care Partnerships, Scottish Care, Scottish Social Care Services Council, Scottish Government representatives from across Directorates, Scottish Executives Nurse Directors, Community Lead Nurses, Health Protection Scotland and NHS Board Public Health Directors. This has been used by care homes across Scotland, and we have continued to work with these stakeholders to ensure that the automated safety huddle is fit for purpose and meets the requirements of the staff who use it, both for the inputting of data at a care home level and on the reviewing of the data.

This work is incredibly important, not only now in our response to COVID-19 but beyond. This will enable more consistent national reporting of the data originally captured through the excel version of the safety huddle returns and will also help to reduce the data burden on our care homes, whilst supporting improved reporting and better analysis of the information on a local and national basis. It will also enable our Health and Social Care Partnerships, NHS Boards and oversight groups undertake their assurance roles which are so important at this time and to ensure that the necessary support is given to the care home sector when it is required.

The tool has been developed so that it is futureproofed, to allow for changes to be made in the future, post COVID-19. Suggestions for future additions to the tool include the addition of quality indicators, including number of complaints, critical incidents, falls, pressure sores, medication errors, no of initial referral discussions relating to adult support and protection etc, which would allow trend reporting for quality improvement. Furthermore, future amendments to the tool could also align with the data collected under the Care Inspectorate legislative framework through the e-form reporting and annual returns. The web based tool has the capacity to add links to the Care Inspectorate e-forms for ease of completion and the data from the safety huddle could be used to provide real time reporting for the Care Inspectorate going forward and support the delivery of evidence based in scrutiny visits.