Frailty virtual ward offers patients innovative community-based healthcare in the comfort of their own home

Halton virtual frailty ward

Bridgewater Community Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust’s (BCHFT) frailty virtual ward is using pioneering technology to allow patients in Halton who are over 65 to safely receive the healthcare they need in the comfort of their own home, rather than a hospital ward.

This integrated ‘Hospital at Home’ service is delivered in partnership between BCHFT, Mersey Care NHS Foundation Trust and Mersey and West Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust, and operates alongside Halton and Warrington’s Urgent Community Response Service.

It was initially set up as a response to COVID-19, but has since been scaled up and numerous additional benefits have been realised, not least a reduction in some of the less serious ambulance call-outs that often result in a trip to hospital for older patients.

The ward is consultant-led and run by a multi-disciplinary team working across different organisations within the Acute, Mental Health and Community sectors, which results in truly joined-up and personalised patient care.

As well as providing home visits to patients at risk of a hospital admission, the team also uses remote technology provided by Docobo to accurately monitor patients remotely from a nurse-led hub. Plans are also underway, in what will be a first in Cheshire and Merseyside, to use video to communicate with virtual ward patients.   

The service is receiving great feedback from patients under the care of the virtual frailty ward service, who are able to be more comfortable at home than in hospital. They can sleep in their own beds, and eat, drink and get up when they want to and often feel more empowered to make decisions about their own care when they’re outside of a hospital environment.

What’s more, these patients are also at a far lower risk of winter bugs and infections such as COVID-19 or flu at home, which if contracted could cause further complications to their health and recovery.

Raj Jain, Chair of NHS Cheshire and Merseyside, visited Bridgewater Community Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust’s (BCHFT) frailty virtual ward on 20 February. Read more about the visit here.