Toolbox Champions

To support trainee editors in making the hospital site achieve its aims of improving patient safety. 
The Toolbox is primarily run by junior doctors in their roles as editors, but occasionally they may need help in order to provide their peers with a fully functioning site. In this context a senior member at the trust can have a valuable input. Editors may need particular assistance when:
a. Liaising with other staff members in the Trust, such as hospital IT
b. Arranging a time/venue to publicise the site in their trust through the year
c. Needing guidance on how best to assess the impact of their site and general advice on how to implement a quality improvement project
Toolbox Champions would not necessarily need to show editors how to edit the site (we can provide such information) but could certainly help out with the more technical side of things if this was something they were interested in.
 

To appoint at least 2 ‘editors’ who will be responsible for building the site and editing and uploading content for the following year. Editors are normally, but not necessarily exclusively, FY1 and FY2 doctors. An editing role would take a doctor approx.1-2 hours of time a week. This trainee role could be done by any proactive doctor it could also be incorporated into a ‘year representatives’ responsibilities. Based on NWTFS the role also allows doctors to complete their own QI project and develop valuable leadership skills. A similar document to this is available to Editors detailing their responsibilities Editors should be appointed in the first month of starting and could potentially be asked to show interest when incoming doctors are first introduced to the site.

It is also very important to appoint new editors each year to ensure continuity of the site when trainees change hospital in August. 
An editor may have to move on at the same time as the new starters arrive; in this case have a permanent member of staff is crucial to provide continuity and the Champion may be required to do a brief introduction of the site or ensure that someone is available to do so.

To ensure a dedicated slot to new trainees for explanation of the Toolbox during their induction period. 
Should the site not be publicised to the incoming doctors then it risks not being used at the point when it holds its greatest value. The outgoing editors are encouraged to do the talk to the new doctors but may need a senior member of staff to convince those organising the induction of the value of the Toolbox to new staff members.
 

An editor’s primary role is to ensure information is up-to-date. They should also ensure that no confidential or defamatory information is put on the Toolbox. The Toolbox is not trying to replace any established sources of information (such as the hospital switchboard or clinical guidelines) but improve general access to information.  Information governance is an important part of Toolbox and we believe that a permanent, senior member of staff should take overall responsibility for the site considering that editors may rotate and people may continue to use the site with no current editor being appointed.
 

To support the editors in ensuring firm specific handbooks or 'survival guides' are submitted or updated by trainees. 
Survival guides are sometimes difficult to collate from all trainees and a friendly reminder by a senior member of staff is often all that is required to facilitate this. Providing contribution to induction is in accordance with GMC guidance that doctors should ‘contribute to the induction of colleagues when asked’.
 

The success of a Trust’s toolbox is limited by access. The most successful sites have links on the desktops of every computer on the trust network and is something we now insist that is done for each new site. This is an easy task for hospital IT to do but routinely seems to be a barrier to success. Common causes for difficulties are communications difficulties between IT and the junior, rotating doctor & misconceptions surrounding the Toolbox. Having a permanent, senior member of staff to help out here often gets the task done.