July 29, 2011

21^st July - Birmingham Post

The Department of Health has singled out a Birmingham hospital for its success in using alternative ways to achieve multi-million pound saving plans.

Birmingham Children's Hospital executives' efforts to protect beds and cut back on excessive supplies of stationary, surgical gloves and other extras have attracted the eye of Whitehall.

It comes after a shake-up to the finance and HR departments a year ago when finance office jobs were outsourced to Wakefield, in Yorkshire, and Pune in India, saving the NHS trust £600,000.

Sarah Jane Marsh, hospital chief executive, said NHS West Midlands health authority had told the Department of Health how well Birmingham Children's Hospital had done on its saving plans, which had circulated this to other hospitals. "We are getting a lots of calls from other foundation trusts for information." said Miss Marsh.

The Foundation Trust has a cost improvement target from the Government of £10million to save in the current financial year.

David Melbourne, chief finance officer at the hospital, said measures had included an overhaul of stationary supplies. "We were using four types of photocopy paper but we only need to get one and one type of pen is sufficient too." he said. "The trust saved £30,000 by changing its stationary. Then there were 50 types of surgical gloves, but we only need two types - latex and non latex. That saved £30,000."

In latest financial risk ratings from overseeing body Monitor, the hospital scored the highest, most secure finance rating of 5 for up to December last year.