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Introduction

Strategy video

Link: https://youtu.be/kpLQZaMJka4

Video transcript

00:00:03:00 - 00:00:09:07

Speaker 1

The best thing about working here is the opportunity to work with friends and colleagues every day in order to make patients better.

00:00:09:09 - 00:00:18:14

Speaker 2

Working as part of a team, I feel really proud and privileged that I'm working with such generous people that are caring and kind and have the same goal as me.

00:00:18:15 - 00:00:31:23

Speaker 3

I love working here and I know others do as well, but I am hearing that staff are tired and things have taken a toll physically and mentally for staff and people need space to recover and recuperate.

00:00:32:07 - 00:00:46:17

Speaker 4

We're seeing more patients than ever before, and sometimes we don't have enough staff, but we're here to make a difference and that's what we do. Even on the worst day of somebody's life, there's always something that we can do to make it a little bit better.

00:00:47:22 - 00:01:15:03

Speaker 5

We all have our own Addenbrooke's story, our own Rosy story, our own CUH story and now we're ready to write the next chapter. The last two years have been beyond difficult for all of us, but through it all, we've been there representing everything that makes Cambridge University Hospitals special, safe kind and excellent. We delivered our last strategy, and now we're looking at what's next.

00:01:15:19 - 00:01:43:02

Speaker 5

We're building on what we've achieved already, and we're refreshing our strategy to meet the needs of our community, patients and staff for the next few years. The next stage of care, learning and research in Cambridge and beyond. Through listening to staff, we've created our new strategy and each of us here has a part to play. We have three priorities: improving patient care, supporting our staff, and building for the future.

00:01:45:09 - 00:02:01:06

Speaker 5

We're improving patient care by changing how we work so that we treat more patients sooner. Working more closely with GP practices and using new technology so that patients can get hospital services closer to home and we're always here in an emergency.

00:02:02:07 - 00:02:14:11

Speaker 6

COVID has resulted in us having a problem with patients through surgery. The number of patients we can do in a day has got smaller and that just means we're getting longer waiting lists and it's terrible for us and it's terrible, especially for the patients.

00:02:14:17 - 00:02:31:14

Speaker 7

So my patients having to wait longer for elective surgery due to COVID. We're looking at different ways of working in order to tackle this problem. So we're looking at increasing our 24-hour pathways through the main day surgery unit at Addenbrookes looking at different pathways that would have required an in-patient bed, and a two or three day stay pre-COVID.

00:02:31:23 - 00:02:46:02

Speaker 7

We're looking at Ely and whether we can put more surgery through Ely and we're looking at weekend working and trying to do more surgeries on the weekends. Some of the changes are small, but some are much bigger, like the dedicated theatre that's been built for hip and knee surgery.

00:02:46:07 - 00:02:55:23

Speaker 6

So with all these new ideas, these new procedures and new ways of working, we're getting more people through. We get more people off the waiting list and home ready to carry on with their lives.

00:02:56:18 - 00:03:13:09

Speaker 1

Dr. Wright, who is a GP at Granta, myself and others, have come together to create a virtual neurology meeting. The advantage of this meeting is that it allows us to discuss cases from around the region, and we don't all have to be in the same place to do so.

00:03:13:14 - 00:03:36:14

Speaker 8

Introducing Dr. Gunawardana into primary care has allowed us to provide a much more seamless service with the patients. We get them seen by the right person in the right place at the right time. It gets investigations done much faster, often with discussions with people they feel comfortable with in a setting they feel more comfortable with. This improves the engagement between both primary and secondary care as well.

00:03:37:02 - 00:03:59:08

Speaker 2

Cytosponge was developed by a team in Cambridge and is finally being introduced into clinical practice, which we are very proud of. The Cytosponge is really simply a pill on a string which patients can swallow with a glass of water. It goes down into the stomach. The gelatin captured dissolves, releases the sponge, and then we gently pull that back collecting cells all along the oesophagus.

00:03:59:08 - 00:04:16:15

Speaker 2

These cells can then be looked at to see whether they need further care or further investigation. So we're working with Primary Care, CCG, Clinical Research Nurses and Harper and then Cancer UK in order to bring this to patients in the community. So that they don't have to go into hospital to access this test.

00:04:16:23 - 00:04:22:10

Speaker 9

We're also setting up virtual wards in the community so that patients get expert care in their own homes after leaving hospital.

00:04:22:20 - 00:04:37:04

Speaker 1

One of the benefits of integrating care is that reduces unnecessary visits to hospital and thereby saves patients time. The other major plus is that by working together as a team, we really develop and strengthen this relationship between primary and secondary care.

00:04:37:17 - 00:05:01:23

Speaker 5

Supporting our staff means having the right workforce to deliver high quality care and investing in education and training so everyone can reach their ambitions and we mean everyone. We are all stronger when we value difference and inclusion. We want working at CUH to be a good experience for people and positively impact their health and wellbeing. Supported by compassionate and enabling relationships with colleagues.

00:05:02:23 - 00:05:12:15

Speaker 4

People are definitely the best thing about working here. I've been here for 13 years and I trained here as well. So it's the people around me that have moulded me to be the nurse I am today.

00:05:12:24 - 00:05:22:04

Speaker 10

I think it's really important that entry level roles exist for everyone and are available to everyone so that you can get into the hospital and get your foot in the door.

00:05:22:14 - 00:05:32:22

Speaker 11

It means a lot for me, I'm a local lad. When I left school, I didn't know what I wanted to do. I love helping people, I like talking to people, quite a sociable guy and them things just make me proud to work here.

00:05:33:15 - 00:05:42:15

Speaker 5

I love working at Addenbrookes is professionally and personally has a lot to learn and there is multi diversity, cultural around there.

00:05:42:16 - 00:05:49:20

Speaker 12

I enjoy working with the people at Addenbrookes because they're enthusiastic about the jobs that they do as well as looking after patients.

00:05:50:04 - 00:05:56:06

Speaker 13

What I like the most about working at CUH is the professional development opportunities and the career progression.

00:05:56:13 - 00:06:07:19

Speaker 14

One of the main challenges living in Cambridge is Cambridge is expensive, especially with finding out accommodation. It would be great if the Trust would help us with some financial assistance or finding out new houses.

00:06:08:01 - 00:06:28:10

Speaker 3

People are what makes CUH really special and that's why we know that we need to focus on recruitment to support our staff, and also we need to focus on retaining the staff that we've got and supporting them to the best of our ability. There are over 12,000 people working here at CUH and understandably not everybody has the same experience.

00:06:28:21 - 00:06:39:09

Speaker 3

So one of the things that we do to really tune in and listen to that staff voice as an example is through our staff networks, they're a great way of staff being able to engage and have their voice heard by the organization.

00:06:40:05 - 00:06:49:14

Speaker 5

Building for the future means leading groundbreaking research and putting this into clinical practice to help us deliver exceptional treatment to more patients.

00:06:50:06 - 00:07:08:10

Speaker 15

CUH has been working in partnership with the University of Cambridge for many years to deliver globally significant genomics research. The immediate impact of that we are now seeing is our ability to deliver specialized and personalized treatments for many of the patients who come to Addenbrooke's Hospital.

00:07:08:13 - 00:07:20:07

Speaker 16

So here at our Cambridge Genomic Labs, we identify strategies that would offer the best treatment options to our patients that would thereby benefit their conditions.

00:07:20:22 - 00:07:31:14

Speaker 17

So there was a lady who's referred to us from the pregnancy clinic who had a history of diabetes in a previous pregnancy, and given her history, we thought it'd be worth just investigating the type of diabetes she had.

00:07:31:19 - 00:07:41:16

Speaker 5

So we invited her along for genetic screening, and this identified that she had a genetic form of diabetes and that enabled the correct treatment pathway for both mother and baby.

00:07:42:03 - 00:08:05:13

Speaker 15

Much of the research carried out at CUH started here many, many years ago, and it gives everybody an enormous sense of satisfaction to see that not only being used to develop new treatments, but also to start the development of big infrastructure projects such as the development of Cambridge Children's and the Cambridge Cancer Hospital, which hopefully we will see completed within the next few years.

00:08:06:22 - 00:08:27:12

Speaker 5

The strategy belongs to all of us, and it will continue to develop as we keep looking ahead. Achieving our vision of a healthier life for everyone. The community around Cambridge University Hospitals is powerful. We all know we're stronger together, and we know we're making a difference then, now and for years to come.

Who we are?

Cambridge University Hospitals – Addenbrooke’s and the Rosie – is a community of twelve thousand people who are passionate about improving people’s lives. We provide services as a local hospital for local people, and as a specialist hospital for a much wider population. As an academic medical centre we work across 75 medical and surgical specialties, with corporate and support teams – and health, care, academic and industry partners – to deliver care, learning and research.

Each of these three strands is equally important: caring for patients who are sick today while training the skilled staff who will care for patients in the future and researching the next generation of advances to clinical practice. Each strand also supports the other two strands: conducting research attracts staff wanting to broaden their skills and enables our patients to benefit from better care sooner; and providing care enables innovative clinical treatments to get into practice sooner.

Our location in Cambridge, as part of an innovation ecosystem, unlocks huge opportunity to go further. As the largest centre of health science and medical research in Europe, we aspire to continue developing the cross-industry partnerships that further improve outcomes for patients while powering economic growth.

Care

CUH provides

  • Emergency, medical and surgical care for a local population of half a million people in Cambridge, South and East Cambridgeshire; and is a member of the Integrated Care Board serving a million people across Cambridgeshire and Peterborough;
  • Specialist services for a regional population of six million people across the East of England; and
  • National services in organ transplantation, cancer, neurosciences, paediatrics, genetics and rare or complex conditions.

Learning

CUH is a teaching hospital for:

  • Medical students from the University of Cambridge;
  • Undergraduate students and apprentices in areas including Nursing, Allied Health Professions, Pharmacy, Radiography, Midwifery, Occupational Therapy and Physiotherapy, from a number of partner Higher Education providers; and
  • Apprentices in non-clinical roles including estates, engineering, maintenance, plumbing, customer service, administration and data.

Research

CUH is

  • Part of the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) through the Cambridge Biomedical Research Centre (BRC);
  • A member of Cambridge University Health Partners (CUHP), one of eight Academic Health Science Centres; and
  • A partner with the University of Cambridge and a thriving ecosystem of life sciences and technology industry on and beyond the Cambridge Biomedical Campus (CBC).

A year at CUH in numbers

Coloured squares containing hospital statistics for CUH, including births, staff, volunteers, ED attendances, ambulance handovers, operations, theatres, meals, income, virtual ward admissions, virtual appointments, day cases, inpatients, outpatient visits
Figures from August 2024

Our values, vision and priorities

Our vision triangle. Vision, values and priorities

Our commitments in summary

Non-urgent advice: Improving patient care

Integrated care

We will work with NHS, other public sector and voluntary sector organisations to improve the health of our local population

Emergency care

When patients come to the hospital in an emergency we will treat them, and help them to return home, quickly

Planned care

When patients need planned care we will see them as quickly and efficiently as possible

Health inequalities

We will tackle disparity in health outcomes, access to care and experience between patient groups

Quality, safety and improvement

We will continuously improve the quality, safety and experience of all our services

Non-urgent advice: Supporting our staff

Resourcing

We will invest to ensure that we are well staffed to deliver safe and high quality care.

Ambition

We will invest in education, learning, development and new ways of working.

Good work

We will strive to ensure that working at CUH will positively impact our health, safety and well-being.

Inclusion

We will seek to drive out inequality, recognising that we are stronger when we value difference and inclusion.

Relationships

We will foster compassionate and enabling working relationships.

Non-urgent advice: Building for the future

Specialised services

We will work with hospitals across the East of England to provide high quality specialised care for more patients closer to home.

Research and life sciences

We will conduct world-leading research that improves care and drives economic growth.

New hospitals and the estate

We will maintain a safe estate and invest in new facilities to improve care for patients locally, regionally and nationally.

Climate change

We will tackle the climate emergency and enhance environmental sustainability.

Digital

We will use technology and data to improve care

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Implementing the strategy

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Clinical team comparing notes