It’s been an award-winning time for Medequip! On 23 October, our Manage At Home team was delighted to be recognised for the ‘Best Online Initiative’ at the Access & Mobility Professional Awards. This trophy hadn’t even made its way home when we won a further three accolades at the Building Better Healthcare Awards on 30 October.
The AMP award recognised the work carried out by our online mobility equipment retail arm in completely overhauling its online platform, successfully making the website quicker, easier and more rewarding for users. In particular, the award recognised that this work has made product identification “…fast, easy and accurate, with features designed specifically to help users navigate and browse products matching their needs.” Congratulations to Matt Ward and his team in Brighouse!
We had put forward two entries for the prestigious Building Better Healthcare Awards, announced on 30 October, and were very pleased to win in both categories. Our colleagues at the Falls Prevention Service on the Wirral were recognised for their ongoing achievements in the ‘Best Patient Safety Initiative’ category.
This new award reflects the current drive to improve patient safety across health and social care settings. Back in July 2015, the Falls Prevention Service was included in the Wirral Independence Service contract and the commission was awarded to Medequip – the first time a falls prevention service has ever been outsourced in the UK. This very small team of multidisciplinary team physiotherapists, occupational therapists, nurses and technical instructors has successfully developed a clear referral pathway, building and enhancing services and facilities for patients to contribute towards a notable reduction in falls and associated costs for Wirral NHS.
We also won the Best Recycle or Reuse Project Award for our innovative Return, Reuse, Recycle campaign, originally developed in partnership with West Suffolk NHS back in 2017. The initial campaign resulted in over 38,000 NHS and social care items being returned over a defined five month period, with an estimated value of more than £3.5m. The campaign has now been rolled out across the Medequip estate.
Alongside these two Awards, we were proud to be one of three companies to win a Patient’s Choice Award, together with West Suffolk NHS Foundation Trust for the Return, Reuse, Recycle campaign. This special Award cannot be applied for; it is given to the entry (across all categories) that the Building Better Healthcare patient representative deems has the biggest impact on the patient experience and outcomes.
The event itself was attended by many prestigious companies in the sector and also numerous CCGs. Medequip was represented by Mike West (Procurement Director) and Sam Holliman (Head of Procurement), who were called upon to make frequent trips to the stage to collect the awards!
Congratulations to all who have worked so hard to make our services award winning!