What is the challenge your project is going to address and how does it connect to the theme of 'How can we improve across system boundaries?​

At CAVUHB, staff strive to deliver compassionate care, but often find themselves unable to do so directly alongside patients. Often expressing they are ‘losing the passion to care’. Workplace disorganisation, wasteful activities, and unclear communication contribute to limited direct care —typically only 45% is direct care. Resulting in diminished patient experiences, weary staff morale, and missed opportunities for evidence-based routines.

To break this cycle, the Releasing Time to Care approach was tested. Facilitators collaborate with teams, exploring seven elements of improvement. In areas where it has been implemented, there has been a 10 to 15% increase in direct patient care.
Positive feedback confirms that the cycle can be broken. A team from CAVUHB and CTMUHB recognised that local facilitators, familiar with specific areas, have been instrumental in driving change. As a result, RT2C has evolved into 200 Minutes Back, a campaign that empowers teams through self-assessment, resources, and community support

What does your project aim to achieve?

By the end of 2026, every ward and patient facing clinical area across Southeast Wales will have used and benefited from 200 Minutes Back. 

All clinical staff working in the areas that have used and benefited from the 200 minutes back programme will get approximately 200 minutes of their time back to be able to deliver care directly to and with the patients they are providing care to. This will come from:

• Reduced waste and developing more effective and efficient ways of working.
• Embedding and sustaining routines and practices that ensure key tasks and activities are reliably and consistently delivered. These are made up of clinical, operational, and importantly around growth and development of the team
• Providing easy to use tools and techniques that become a part of the routines and practices which will ensure that improvement is a part of a team’s day to day habits and behaviours.

How will the project be delivered?

The project is to deliver the aims and objectives through:

• The development of an easy-to-use self-assessment tool that enables teams identify and focus on areas for improvement
• The creation of free access guides with tools, templates and media to guide local leaders through the process
• Engaging with organisations across the heath system
  The creation and sustainable maintenance of a community through a website where teams can track and share their efforts.
• Establishing a Campaign and socialising people’s efforts
• Establishing a learning system that enables the campaign to adapt to changing needs
• A launch event and subsequent network, share, learn and celebrate events

This will be achieved using experts and local champions committed by the engaged organisations to create and establish the campaign and resources.

The key measure of success will be the number of engaged areas and the increased percentage of direct care which will be captured on the website

How is your project going to share learning?

As this is a campaign its success depends on building a community and to do that you have to share openly and socialise everything that is happening, both successes and failures.

The website and social media will be core to that sharing and learning and whilst the initial aim is for South East Wales it will be available to any clinical team in any part of the UK or beyond.

Over the coming years the campaign hopes to be able to share its story many times with the Q community, IHI, Improvement Cymru & others, and show that the core elements are applicable in clinical and non clinical areas