Publish date: 8 May 2024
Stepping into patients' shoes: How VR is improving understanding and support at Northumbria Healthcare
Porters at Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust were given the chance to walk in the shoes of older patients living with conditions such as frailty and dementia.
It came as Northumbria Healthcare’s Enhanced Care for Older People (EnCOP) team recently brought the world of virtual reality (VR) to the trust’s hospital wards.
Northumbria Healthcare launched the EnCOP initiative in July 2022. Its mission is to support staff to explore and implement care solutions for older individuals, who may live with complex and evolving conditions.
From the beginning of 2024, the EnCOP team has extended its training offering to non-clinical teams that support patients and carers. Teams that will benefit include porters, chaplains, domestic and clerical staff, and volunteers.
The EnCOP team visited Wansbeck General Hospital, North Tyneside General Hospital, Hexham General Hospital, Alnwick and Berwick Infirmary and Haltwhistle War Memorial Hospital to help colleagues understand the challenges that older patients face. They did this through VR headsets that replicate the visual conditions patients with different stages of frailty and dementia can experience.
Clare Collins, pharmacy technician and EnCOP educator community lead, said: "Sessions like this are a great opportunity for us to work with our colleagues on the ground to understand the patient experience. It’s very exciting to be able to extend the work that our EnCOP team does to non-clinical staff who already provide such brilliant support to patients. Supporting staff to improve the all-round experience is at the heart of everything we do within EnCOP and the trust in general.
"Non-clinical teams are an important part of the patient experience. They are friendly, empathetic, and understanding towards patients, working alongside our clinical teams to deliver the highest level of care possible. By giving them insight into the patient experience, we believe it will help them understand how they can better support people living with frailty and dementia."
Charlene Sturgeon, head porter at Wansbeck General Hospital, said: "Using the VR headsets was an eye-opening experience for our team. As porters, we work with patients daily and build relationships with them throughout their stay with us.
"Understanding their challenges first-hand gives us the tools we need to improve their experience on our wards and, hopefully, create a better environment for them to receive care."
Media contact
Christopher Magee, marketing and communications officer
Christopher.Magee@northumbria-healthcare.nhs.uk