Description of an alerting service for NHS commissioners- delivery, feedback and issues.

1. Knowledge@lerts for
commissioners
Anne Gray, Knowledge Officer
Milton Keynes PCT /CCG
TFPL Health SIG, 21 June 2012

2. Don’t reinvent the CAS
Timely evidence
Mapping exercise:
•What do people need to
know?
•What alerting services already
exist?
•What are the gaps?
Supporting commissioners
Good practice behind service
development
more recently …
Health and Social Care Bill
/Act ie CCG development , CSU
development and the new
healthcare landscape

3. Knowledge@lerts
• Signpost, don’t duplicate existing alerting
services
• Highlight resources which could be missed
• Short and to the point – must be quick and easy
to write and read
• Bring out local content/aspects
• Weekly to keep short – never more than 2 sides
of A4
Also
• PR exercise for NHS librarians
• Good way to keep up with developments

4. Knowledge@lerts
Inline email
All MK CCG staff and GPs
and lots of others
Items short & easy to scan
Full URLs
A short archive on the
Quality MK website

5. Feedback survey
• Very poor response (7%) from 233 recipients
• Out of 17
– 10 always/usually read same day
– 15 always/usually scanned to the end
– 14 always/usually found items of interest
– 8 always/usually clicked through to item(s)
– 8 always/usually stored for future use

6. Feedback…
• “contributes to my thinking about key issues”
• “Provides me with information on how things
are done elsewhere which accelerates
learning and avoids duplication”
• “they have helped my/developed my thinking
… or I would not give them the time”
• “This is really excellent stuff. This is my day
job and I have learnt a lot from your bulletin”

7. Respond to user need
• Knowledge@lerts for CCGs
– CCG authorisation and development material - Jan
2012 onwards
• Commissioning Support Units/Services
– Ad hoc email bulletin sent to small (but locally
influential) group

8. Issues
• Keeping up to date with other CASs
• Keeping up to date with user needs
• Time to identify relevant items, scan and
compile bulletins
• Retrieving material from previous bulletins
• Getting feedback