Ear, nose and throat surgery: GIRFT Programme National Specialty Report (November 2019)

Summary

Getting It Right First Time (GIRFT) is designed to improve the quality of care within the NHS by reducing unwarranted variations. By tackling variations in the way services are delivered across the NHS, and by sharing best practice between trusts, GIRFT identifies changes that will help improve care and patient outcomes, as well as delivering efficiencies such as the reduction of unnecessary procedures and cost savings.

Content

There are 330,000 admissions to ear, nose and throat (ENT) departments every year in England and 2.8 million ENT outpatient appointments. This GIRFT report for ENT reviewed 126 ENT units across the country and makes 23 recommendations to improve care for patients and reduce costs for the NHS, including:

• increasing the use of day case surgery for ENT.
• reducing late cancellations.
• freeing up consultant time by making better use of specialist nurses.

Watch a short video summary of the report