Kieran and John are both hugely respected in the world of urology, and I am delighted to have them on board with GIRFT as we move into the second phase of our work to help improve urological services.

The recommendations in Simon Harrison’s national report have been instrumental in driving significant changes for the better in units across England, but there is always more we can do. I look forward to seeing further innovation and improvement as our re-visit process gets under way …

I’m delighted to be joining the GIRFT team with John McGrath.

Simon Harrison’s excellent report signposted many of the challenges facing the specialty. With a workforce shortfall in urology and with the rising urological requirements of an ageing population, there is a pressing need to develop the urological workforce, while ensuring that standards are maintained.

The GIRFT report identified significant national variation in the management of common conditions, and I look forward to helping support the progress of urology area networks, enabling the development of specialist care and improving core services in elective and emergency care …

The GIRFT programme has enormous potential to deliver further improvements in urological care for patients across England by building on the strong platform that Simon Harrison and his team have already established.

I am looking forward to supporting the ongoing development of UANs as well as accelerating the spread of best practice in areas such as day case surgery.

Specialist nurses are right at the centre of high quality urological care and we have a great opportunity to working alongside the British Association of Urological Nurses to look at how we develop these roles further …

Following on from the GIRFT National Specialty Report on Urology, the GIRFT team have published a handbook of good practice in urology, "Gettging It Right In Urology". This contains:

• Guidance on how Urology Departments and Trusts might go about establishing collaborative working arrangements within a Urology Area Network.  It is hoped that most Urologists will, by now, be aware of which other Urology Units they are likely to be networking with.
• A set of 23 case studies, produced by Urology Departments from around the country, that describe innovative ways of working and delivering services.  These examples of such practice came to light during the GIRFT visits to Trust Urology Departments.  There are doubtless many other examples which remain largely out of sight to the Urology community. 

It is hoped that the portfolio of case studies will increase over time; BAUS members are encouraged to contact the GIRFT Urology team with further examples of innovation that would be of wider interest.  It should be noted that GIRFT has not formally evaluated the practices that the case studies describe - clinicians are urged to judge whether adopting similar protocols and procedures would be expected to be of benefit to their own department.  This is information-sharing, rather than a policy-directive ...