Accreditation success ensures continued high quality care for patients

Two teams have successfully retained the necessary accreditation to continue the high quality level of care offered to patients in Clinical Haematology and Oncology at Derriford Hospital.

As the main referral centre for the South West Peninsula Transplant Service, Plymouth Hospitals NHS Trust requires an inspection every few years by an international standards and accreditation body, JACIE. Becoming re-certified is not only essential for the Trust to retain its specialist commissioning status, but it is also a mandatory condition, for its licence to transplant, from the Human Tissue Authority.

“Retaining accreditation to JACIE means that patients diagnosed with diseases of the blood, such as leukaemia, myeloma and lymphoma, will continue to receive excellent care,” explains Dr Hannah Hunter, Consultant Haematologist at Derriford Hospital and Programme Director of the Service. “Since our first accreditation in 2012, we’ve received around £3 million to fund both the Transplant High Dependency Unit (Bracken) and Day Case Unit (Birch).

“These dedicated purpose-built facilities are essential for patients receiving treatment, as they have no immune system for a period of time while the transplant engrafts and ultimately require a great deal of careful monitoring.”

Royal Cornwall Hospital and Torbay Hospital have also been re-accredited following Plymouth’s success, due to their partnership as part of the service.

“We hope that this year’s achievement will help us to jointly provide even more complex treatments and therapies, as well as to repatriate patients from Bristol,” adds Dr Hunter.

Oncology Team Group Photo The Plymouth Oncology Centre is also currently celebrating its re-certification by the UK's National Accreditation Body UKAS to the new ISO 9001:2015 standards, a transition from the former 2008 requirements. The Centre provides radiotherapy and chemotherapy in an inpatient and outpatient setting, in three sites across the hospital; Brent, Lyd and Radiotherapy.

“The standards have changed significantly over the last eight years,” describes Dr Sarah Pascoe, Clinical Director of Oncology. “It has taken a lot of very hard work across the team to redefine our quality management system and processes to meet the new requirements.

“This accreditation is a significant achievement and we are immensely proud. I’m really grateful to everyone whose teamwork and dedication has helped us to achieve this milestone.”

Rob Wosley, Governance & Accreditation Manager for Haematology and Oncology Services at the Trust, believes that patients will directly benefit from these accomplishments:

“Achieving these standards shows that both teams are amongst the best in the country in delivering high-quality care to patients facing life-changing illnesses. Without these standards, we would not be permitted to provide as many of the excellent treatments that we do, and patients would be forced to travel to Bristol, or even further afield, in order to receive the treatment they need.”