Why is there a need to improve home oxygen services?
Home oxygen therapy is provided to about 85,000 people in England at a cost of approximately £110 million a year. Many Primary Care Trusts (PCTs) do not undertake quality assured clinical assessment and review of their patients need for long term home oxygen increasing the potential for poor quality care and waste.
The Department of Health estimates that around 30% of people prescribed oxygen either derive no clinical benefit from it or do not use their oxygen. Gross savings of up to 40% - equivalent nationally to £45 million a year, or £300,000 per PCT can potentially be achieved through the establishment of home oxygen services, oxygen register review and formal clinical assessment.
What are we are doing?
This workstream aims to establish ‘How to’ implement Home Oxygen Service-Assessment and Review (HOS-AR) in line with the HOS-AR Good Practice Guide and meet the requirements of the NHS Quality, Innovation, Productivity and Prevention initiative. This involves ensuring patients have a clinical requirement for oxygen through formal assessment, the effective use of data, regular clinical review of patients, review of oxygen registers and service integration.
What have we found so far?
Early indications are that the improvement work spans three phases:
- Data review and data, management
- Establishment of a formal assessment service and
- Service integration and sustainability
Emerging themes from the work centre on Data coordination, Consistent messages to patients and Service integration and the initial project cost efficiencies support DH cost saving estimates
For more information on this workstream contact:
Ore Okosi
National Improvement Lead
Lung Improvement Programme
NHS Improvement
Mobile: 0776 644 1093
Email: ore.okosi@improvement.nhs.uk