40th Day of Lent: Going without a real assessment within four hours – Spot the Difference Competition

Below, you’ll find the old Norfolk & Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust (NSFT) Crisis Resolution & Home Treatment Team (CRHT) referral form and the current one. How many differences can you spot?

Of course, the big difference between the old and the current form is the additional box entitled ‘CRHT Triage Contact within four hours of referral to AAT.’ Originally, NSFT’s radical redesign was supposed to guarantee an emergency face-to-face assessment within four hours of referral. Now NSFT measures whether it has met its four hour assessment target by whether this new box has been completed with a phone call. There may not be a proper assessment for hours or days afterwards. Why is NSFT ‘triaging’ referrals that have often already been deemed an emergency by health professionals and by the Access & Assessment Team (AAT)?

Is this really what the clinical commissioners meant when they demanded improved assessment performance or is North Norfolk Clinical Commissioning Group (NNCCG), the lead CCG, having the wool pulled over its eyes?

Has NNCCG noticed that when NSFT sends its latest ‘manual reporting’ data claiming 100% performance for 4-hour referrals, the small print in the legend states ‘All 4 hour referrals have been contacted / assessed without breaches’?

NNCCG, please note, NSFT doesn’t mean contacted and assessed, it means contacted or assessed: the waiting list has simply been moved from a waiting list in Access & Assessment to a new one in the CRHT. Does NNCCG even know how long the average wait is for a proper assessment? The information it is currently receiving is clinically meaningless.

Original Crisis Team Referral Form:

Current Crisis Team Referral Form: