An innovative system which is helping to transform the way neurosurgeons meet the needs of critically ill patients has been recognised at a top awards ceremony.

NORSe, which stands for Neurological On-call Referral System, along with the Pharmacy On-call System (POCS), which streamlines the work of pharmacists, was one of the finalists at the Wireless Achievement Awards for Innovation in the Public Sector.

Jim Williams, University Hospitals Birmingham NHS Foundation Trust’s (UHB) Application Development Manager, was at the awards ceremony, held at Blackberry World in the United States, with the Trust’s Director of IT, Steve Chilton.

Jim said: “It was a very proud moment. Very satisfying.”

The judges were impressed with the NORSe Blackberry smartphone application, which has brought real benefits to patients.

Jim, who worked with web company Webalo, said work began on the idea about a year ago after an inquiry from Graham Flint, Lead Consultant for Neurosurgery. He was keen to find a more efficient way of liaising with other medical teams and improve record quality.

Mr Flint explained: “Emergency referrals make up a very large part of neurosurgical practice; at least 50 per cent.  Many of these referrals are for critically ill patients, and colleagues in referring hospitals need to get neurosurgical advice promptly.

“The previous system relied on landline phones, which is inefficient. NORSe has greatly accelerated the speed of diagnosis and treatment, which has brought real benefits for the patients. The new system has also reduced costs and provides an important audit trail.”

Similarly, POCS has improved pharmacists' efficiency and brought fresh benefits for patients.

Ann Slee, Pharmacy Director, explained that the system aims to identify current workloads and future needs of the Trust's on-call service, as well as providing an opportunity to monitor the different types of call so any issues can be identified and resolved.  

Pharmacists can use their Blackberrys to look up the details of any of the 86,000 drugs available and meet requests from medical teams.

Ann explained: “Over the last few months, considerable changes have been made to the service which we were concerned would have had an impact on call out rates.

“Using the new system we are able to understand service impact changes and have demonstrated a reduction in the workload and type of calls. Trends have also allowed us to look at how we triage (prioritise) calls more effectively and involve high grade nursing staff to ensure that the service is not abused.

“This is a long way from the previous system, in which paper records were completed and had to be manually collated and reviewed.”