This week FCMS held a drop-in session to show the Clinical Assessment Service (CAS) at work in South Yorkshire. We were pleased to have representatives from the Yorkshire Ambulance Service, South Yorkshire ICB, Doncaster and Bassetlaw NHS Trust and other healthcare stakeholders in attendance.
What is a CAS?
The Clinical Assessment Service (CAS) forms part of our Urgent Care delivery. Our highly skilled team provides additional clinical validation for patients who are referred via NHS111, 999 or by another healthcare professional. The CAS is staffed by clinicians including Senior Nurses, Pharmacists and General Practitioners.
The CAS team ensures that patients receive the most appropriate onward care and can refer to a wide range of services. This has the positive outcome of not only supporting the patient to receive a timely intervention to support their issue but also reducing the pressure on other parts of the health service.
CAS clinicians can issue prescriptions which can be sent and picked up from a community pharmacy. The team can also directly book into other services. This is a huge help to patients who know they have an appointment time in a service that’s suited to their level of need, rather than the alternative which may have been a potentially lengthy wait in an Urgent or Emergency Care service.
Courtney Clark, CAS Lead at FCMS, stated…
The CAS at Work event was a great success, it gave us the opportunity to showcase how important and effective the Clinical Assessment Service has been in Doncaster. The Clinical Assessment Service promotes deflecting patients away from emergency services where clinically appropriate and streamlining them to other services. As an alternative the patients could be referred to an Urgent Treatment Centre, Out of Hours Service and in some cases home management/self-care advice is appropriate, the team in Doncaster did an amazing job in showcasing how the service runs on a day-to-day basis. As the Clinical Assessment Service continues to grow we are excited and passionate about providing an exceptional level of care for all of our patients.
