Following the Covid-19 pandemic, the NHS faced a significant waiting list backlog due to the postponement and cancellation of elective procedures reflecting long-standing healthcare system capacity challenges.

Clearing this backlog was proving difficult due to existing, and pandemic-exacerbated challenges, such as resource constraints, workforce shortages, inconsistent data quality, and capacity limitations. The backlog prolonged patient waiting times, driving poorer patient experience, increased suffering, and potentially irreparable patient harm.

Many NHS Trusts struggled to understand the true state their backlog, due to challenges with legacy technology infrastructure and disparate unconnected data systems making it harder to establish the waiting list position. Without a trusted single view for waiting patients and theatre sessions, Trusts would struggle to effectively prioritise patients and optimise limited operating theatre capacity.

To respond to this challenge NHS England commissioned Palantir to establish the Improving Elective Care Coordination Pilot (IECCP). The IECCP programme created the innovative digital Care Coordination Solution (CCS), built on Palantir’s leading Foundry data software platform. CCS was designed to help Trusts reduce their elective waitlist by giving users intuitive access to all key data in one place. This enabled collaboration across all teams working on the elective pathway, by improving data quality and helping staff to maximise theatre utilisation with improved data driven scheduling. 

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The NHS and Palantir required support in driving maximum adoption of the CCS solution to ensure it delivered it’s promised benefits. KPMG partnered with Palantir to address this challenge for six NHS Trusts (Bath, Salisbury, North Midlands, Lincoln, West Herts and NorthTees).

KPMG were appointed to:

• Drive buy-in by demonstrating CCS to hospital staff, (executive management, medical consultants, management, nurses and administrative staff).

• Improve scheduling processes with the CCS (e.g. theatre planning sessions).

• Train hospital staff, using a combination of in-person workshops and bespoke training and change management support.

• Ensure continued success by enabling CCS champions within Trusts, and upskilling NHS England resources to deliver ongoing training.

• Leverage KPMG operational excellence expertise to rapidly translate user feedback into technical requirements for Palantir engineers to drive continuous solution improvements.

Benefits to client

The NHS was able to successfully implement the CCS in the six NHS Trusts.

KPMG’s blend of analytics, technology implementation and NHS operational expertise added significant value to Palantir’s ability to successfully deploy the tool. In particular, the team’s NHS operational perspective and deep understanding of NHS user needs allowed Palantir to increase buy-in and adoption of the tool.

Tangible benefits included: 

5% increases in theatre utilisation enabling thousands of additional treatments.

300 improvements to theatre scheduling made using automated CCS alerts.

10,000 patient entries with potential data quality issues flagged to help to prioritise patient scheduling.

KPMG joined at a pivotal time to drive rapid user adoption in 12 weeks. Their expertise established credibility with front-line staff and their dedicated team worked collaboratively and flexibly with NHS England, Palantir and Trust staff to provide high value cost-effective. We couldn’t have met our goals without their help. The tangible benefits to patients from the IECCP programme have been pivotal to supporting the case for a much more ambitious and substantial transformation programme

Ayub Bhayat
Chief Data Officer
NHS England (Deputy CDAO)

Recognised by the Management Consultancies Association Awards

We partnered with Palantir to help six NHS trusts reduce elective surgery waitlists by implementing an innovative digital solution, improving theatre scheduling, and enhancing patient care through data-driven collaboration.

This project has won the Social Value category at the MCA Awards 2024.