New tool for multidisciplinary cancer teams to increase efficiency and improve care for patients
Researchers at the Florence Nightingale School of Nursing and Midwifery, King’s College London, working with a consultant urologist, James Green (Green Cross Medical Ltd), and with input from healthcare team expert Dr Nick Sevdalis of Imperial College London, have developed an online assessment and feedback tool, which has just been launched by Public Health England.
The tool, called Multidisciplinary Team – Feedback for Improving Teamworking (MDT-FIT), has been developed to enable multidisciplinary teams (MDTs) to self‐assess and improve their teamworking, to deliver more joined-up care for their patients and deliver better patient experiences and outcomes.
MDT‐FIT has been developed and tested with input from over 100 MDTs, from more than 20 NHS Trusts across England, and the evaluation has included interviews with over 250 NHS staff. The majority of MDT members interviewed expressed positive views about MDT‐FIT, with many stating that the tool has helped facilitate improvements to their team’s effectiveness.
While MDT-FIT has been specifically designed to meet the needs of cancer MDTs, the researchers behind the tool believe it has wider applications, across multiple healthcare settings, including long-term conditions, to deliver meaningful improvements to teamworking and patient care.
Dr Cath Taylor, who led on the project at King’s College London said, “Improving patient care through improving teamwork is a key feature of a lot of the successful innovation happening in the NHS today and we know that effective multidisciplinary teamwork is critical to high quality cancer care. However, whilst a national survey, completed by over 2000 cancer health professionals, showed a high level of agreement about the characteristics of effective MDT working, until now there has been no structured or formal way for teams to monitor and measure their effectiveness in relation to these characteristics.
“MDT-FIT has been developed not only to allow MDTs to assess how far their team has adopted the characteristics of an effective team, but it also provides a forum through which the strengths of their teamworking can be highlighted, and problems can be openly discussed and addressed. Our research shows that this is leading to direct improvements in teamworking across MDTs.
“We know how important MDTs are in providing seamless, quality care and treatment for cancer patients, and also how busy the healthcare professionals within MDTs are. What’s unique about this tool is that it is designed to be developmental for teams, rather than a judgemental external measurement of success. The priorities for improvement are determined by the team, with Trust management support built into the process. This not only makes the application and running of MDT-FIT cost effective, but also ensures actions can be implemented, and good practice can be shared across teams”.
MDT-FIT is available nationwide. Those interested in trialling MDT-FIT within Cancer MDTs, should make an enquiry through the NHS IQ website
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Information on MDT-FIT:
The project to create MDT-FIT was part of the National Cancer Action Team’s 'MDT Development' work stream, and followed the publication of ‘The Characteristics of an Effective MDT’ report (NCAT, 2010)
The MDT-FIT process works in three stages, each designed to use as little of team members’ time as possible:
1) All members of MDT anonymously complete a 15 minute questionnaire. As the MDT-FIT software is hosted on the internet, staff can complete from anywhere with internet access. An independent assessment of teamworking within an MDT meeting is completed by a nominated Trust manager or clinician using a structured Meeting Observation Tool.
2) A feedback report is generated, comprising the questionnaire responses and independent observational assessment, and sent to each of the team members. Team members are advised to spend 20 minutes reading and thinking about the feedback.
3) All team members attend a one hour, team discussion about the feedback report facilitated by a nominated Trust manager or clinician from outside of the team. Team members determine if there are actions for improvement that require Trust input and/or resources and these are taken to a further meeting with the Trust senior management.
MDT-FIT is available nationwide. http://www.nhsiq.nhs.uk/improvement-programmes/long-term-conditions-and-integrated-care/mdt-fit-tool.aspx
For further information, interview or comment, please contact:
Oliver Stannard, Communications Officer
Florence Nightingale School of Nursing and Midwifery
King’s College London
Tel: 020 7848 3062
Email: oliver.stannard@kcl.ac.uk
Notes to editors:
About the Florence Nightingale School of Nursing & Midwifery
The Florence Nightingale School of Nursing & Midwifery at King’s College London is the world’s first professional School of Nursing, established by Florence Nightingale.
The number one Nursing and Midwifery School in London (Complete University Guide 2014) and highly regarded by leading London NHS Trusts with links to industry, health services and policy makers, the School develops leading-edge nurses and midwives of tomorrow – practitioners, partners, and leaders in their field.
The School has over 1,000 full-time students training to be nurses and midwives plus an extensive portfolio of undergraduate and postgraduate activities to meet the needs of a wide range of healthcare professionals seeking continuing professional development. The School is at the forefront of health services, policy and evaluation research and home to the influential National Nursing Research Unit (NNRU). For further information visit: www.kcl.ac.uk/nursing.
About Green Cross Medical Ltd
Green Cross Medical Ltd was established in 2010 to allow experts in the field of teamworking research to synchronise their clinical and academic skills with practical applications to aid MDT working in the UK.
The members of Green Cross Medical Ltd have nationally and internationally acknowledged expertise in this area. We aim to provide solutions that are “Patient‐centred rather than process or system driven” with the ultimate goal of improving patient care and experience.
About King’s College London
For further information about King's College London, please see the King's in Brief page.