A government focus on supporting trusts to eradicate agency spend and put funding back into patient care has given health leaders a workforce challenge. NHS Professionals’ service director of National Bank, Rebecca Stark, writes here about a flexible workforce solution to support NHS organisations to meet these new targets.
Across the NHS, healthcare staffing leaders are looking to reduce agency spend and find more ways to manage workforce challenges effectively.
It has never been more important to adopt flexibility and implement technology solutions to address the wide range of changing requirements facing the system.
NHS Professionals National Bank™ was created to respond to these challenges.
What is National Bank?
It may be that many of you have heard the name National Bank mentioned but are still unclear as to what it is and exactly how it works.
National Bank is an agency alternative offering that fills the gap between an NHS healthcare organisation’s own staff bank provision and the use of external agencies.
It provides an integrated, cost-effective solution to NHS temporary staffing requirements and greater access to health professionals.
This includes working with NHS trusts and integrated care boards.
Saving taxpayer’s money
NHS Professionals is uniquely owned by the Department of Health and Social Care, which means any money saved or generated by using NHS Professionals National Bank™ keeps any staffing spend within the health system.
As the leading provider of flexible workers to the NHS, NHS Professionals has the experience and knowledge to deliver this innovative service, continuing our mission to help NHS healthcare organisations reduce external agency spend and create continuity of care for patients.
By choosing the NHS Professionals National Bank™, NHS healthcare organisations receive the following benefits displayed in the below infographic:
Staff to support your existing bank
NHS Professionals National Bank™ maximises the opportunity for NHS organisations to use health professionals where needed.
It also provides new career opportunities in a variety of healthcare settings, to retain talented people in the NHS and support patient care.
This, however, is not a traditional managed service: it is a supplementary bank workforce solution deployed through seamless integration with existing rostering technology.
It acts as an extension to the current bank in place, instead of using external healthcare recruitment agencies.
Real stories, real success
Since launching the service in June 2021, NHS Professionals has partnered with the 24 organisations, including Bridgewater Community Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust in Warrington, Cheshire.
“We would highly recommend using the National Bank as an additional bank resource”
Gareth Pugh
We worked with the trust in 2023 to understand their challenges with high off-framework agency usage. It was crucial that we supported with a plan, which took a phased approach to guarantee consistent and safe levels of staffing while we made the necessary changes.
The next step was to create clear, consistent messaging across the trust to promote joining the National Bank and held drop-in sessions and virtual Q&As to support managers with conversations when encouraging agency staff to migrate.
Also, we collaborated with the trust to provide agency partners with clear, defined deadlines of when off-framework shifts were going to be ‘turned off’ and how shift availability for agencies was set to reduce, unless they migrated.
The result?
The migration to National Bank has reduced the trust’s agency spend, saving up to £8 per hour for registered nurses.
This led to 0% off framework agency use recorded by the end of January 2024 and a pool of nearly 80 health professionals working in this new way.
So, what was the trust’s experience?
Assistant director of finance at Bridgewater Community Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust, Gareth Pugh, explains below:
“Having NHS Professionals on board with their National Bank solution has made a positive impact on reducing our reliance on agency after the pandemic. The National Bank Team have been proactive and supportive throughout and this effort has been a true collaboration.
“We have appreciated their assistance with the removal of off-framework agency usage. NHS Professionals are now supporting us with the next phase of the agency reduction plan to ensure our patients receive continuous levels of service.
“We would highly recommend using the National Bank as an additional bank resource.”
