Nurses who helped to develop a new digital call system at Chase Farm Hospital (CFH) have been nominated for a Nursing Times Award.

The team, led by clinical implementation lead Fiona Morcom, have been nominated in the technology and data in nursing category of the awards

The nurse call system is integrated with a handset, which connects them with to their patients and colleagues at the touch of a button. It means they can respond to patients quickly and spend less time on administrative tasks.  

The system is part of the new digital Chase Farm Hospital, the first paperless hospital in the NHS. The hospital needed to explore more creative ways of adapting to the new working environment, which includes a 50 bed surgical ward of which there are 42 side rooms. The system allows staff to identify which patient is calling and if necessary talk directly to the patient whilst on the move. This saves wasted time and footfall, freeing up nurses to spend more time in direct care.

Fiona said: “We’re absolutely delighted to have been nominated for this award. This was a huge project and we needed to get it right. Following an assessment of how much time we spent on non-clinical activities at the old Chase Farm Hospital, we realised we needed a digital system that would free staff up to deliver direct care to patients and be easy to use by every member of staff.

 “It was my job to ensure the system was user-friendly, to understand where the challenges lay for nurses in using this new system and what could be adapted and developed by us to further integrate it into our daily work.

“The feedback from the staff has been that they love the new technology. It’s so much more than a call system. It’s a communication platform that lets them see what’s happening across the hospital, as well as communicate with patients and colleagues.” 

Picture caption: The Ascom call system used at Chase Farm Hospital.