NHS trial scheme cuts alcohol-related admissions by half

An NHS Trust has found that it drastically reduced alcohol-related admissions and saved £250,000 when it identified and helped the most at-risk patients in a scheme which could be rolled out across the UK.

Since 2014, Walsall Healthcare NHS Trust has saved a quarter of a million pounds and cut alcohol-related admissions by half by focusing on just 10 ‘frequent flyers’.

The trust noted that 10 patients accounted for 499 hospital admissions between them in just six months, each patient being hospitalised twice a week on average.

As reported by The Morning Advertiser, the patient safety manager at the trust, Daniel Hodgkiss, told the House of Commons that having identified the problem drinkers work was done with various services ranging from social and mental health to the police to ensure that those individuals were placed under greater care and supervision (many also have drug problems and mental health issues and are known to social services).

Over the course of four years, Hodgkiss added that multi-agency interventions with 38 regular patients had saved hundreds of thousands of pounds and it was “highly likely” there had been further savings for other public services as a result.

Between 2016 and 2017, this focus cut admissions by 54% and saw a 68% reduction in bed days. The cost of the scheme to public services was described as “negligible”.

Mike Wood, chairman of the All-Party Parliamentary Beer Group, has written to Public Health Minister, Steve Brine MP, to highlight these results and call for their greater implementation across the country.

Under guidance from the Walsall trust, this new approach has already been introduced to neighbouring areas.

Wood wrote in his letter: “While word of mouth has played its role in the spread of this good practice, we are convinced that the message deserves to be amplified on a national level.

“There is a great opportunity to reduce alcohol harm and save the NHS a considerable amount of money if the Walsall approach was adopted as a blueprint across the wider NHS.”