TIME FOR A CHANGE? DEVELOPING A NEW SYSTEM WIDE MODEL FOR CAPACITY MANAGEMENT AND ALLOCATION OF PRACTICE PLACEMENTS

D. O'Connor¹, G. Cornell², L. Shorney³, K. Heggs⁴, R. Schofield⁵

¹Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, United Kingdom, ²Health Education England, North West, Manchester, United Kingdom, ³University of Liverpool, School of Health Sciences, Liverpool, United Kingdom, ⁴Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust, Professional Education and Development, Manchester, United Kingdom, ⁵Liverpool University Hospitals, Liverpool, United Kingdom

Background: Physiotherapy students within the United Kingdom (UK) are required to complete a minimum of 1000 hours to facilitate registration with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC). There are rising student numbers in line with workforce planning requirements, leading to challenges in the management of sufficient practice-based learning experiences to accommodate increased demand. Within the North-West (NW) of England, high demand is a challenge with six Higher Education Institutions (HEI) offering twelve different pre-registration physiotherapy programmes.The process for identifying practice learning experiences has led to competition between HEIs, insufficient numbers of learning experiences to match student demand; with long-standing and ongoing tensions across an academic year, as teams worked tirelessly to source more capacity as needed.A lack of ownership and accountability also led to last minute cancellations, further contributing to poor student and educator experience.

Purpose: The aim of this work was to develop a region-wide framework for the management of an equitable and sustainable capacity management model to support learners to undertake their essential practice learning experiences.

Methods: This paper reports the process of developing the framework, based on the principle of fair share allocation. The model uses baseline workforce staffing data to determine the number of places each National Health Service (NHS) provider organisation needs to provide at required timepoints across the year to meet fluctuating demand.Regional mapping of all physiotherapy programmes and placement dates enabled transparency of when learners need to be accommodated across the system.This informed the peak demand periods and enabled honest conversations about how, as a NW region, the placement providers could work together to meet the needs of these learners.

Results: The model is currently in the first phase of implementation and has enabled all learners to be appropriately allocated for window one (September – December 2022) before the start of the academic year. A regional steering group has been developed to provide sustainable governance and oversight. There are lessons learnt from the initial implementation that will inform and develop processes moving forwards, particularly around change management and challenging historical practices.This paper will share these lessons and the refinement of the model and subsequent roll out to other Allied Health Professions across the NW region.

Conclusions: System wide engagement and collaboration has enabled a whole-scale change in the approach to the utilization and management of capacity across Physiotherapy providers within the NW England.Use of workforce staffing data has provided a ‘fair share’ approach that ensures accountability for Physiotherapy learners across all organisations.This streamlined approach has challenged cultural allocation processes, enabling timely communication, shared ownership and empowerment of practice staff responsible for ensuring a quality learner experience.

Implications: This project demonstrates a highly effective change management process across UK NHS provider organisations. Clear engagement, regular communication and system wide ownership is essential to ensure organisational change. Whilst there will be ongoing lessons to be learnt, the new practice learning reform model is an efficient and transparent process that can be replicated across other professions, other regions and within the private and voluntary sector.

Funding acknowledgements: This work did not attract funding but was supported by Health Education England (North-West).

Keywords:
Practice-based learning
Physiotherapy student placements
AHP practice learning reform model

Topics:
Education: clinical
Professional issues: business skills, leadership, advocacy & change management
Professional issues

Did this work require ethics approval? No

Reason: This is a process evaluation and change management piece of work. It does not involve patients or students directly as it describes innovation and a change of established practices around managing student allocations.