Belfast Cardiac CT Training Fund

Public benefits

There are two main public benefits which flow from our purpose: 1) Education: The NHS is struggling financially to keep up with the demands of an aging population and increasingly expensive treatments. Staff education is often sacrifised when budgeting. The fund aims to provide a source to provide for financial support for radiographers and Nurses

within the Trust to attend and present at conferences. 2)Health: as a result of education, staff will advance their expertise in novel Cardiac imaging, further advancing the skills within the Trust and providing a catalyst for early management and intervention in cardiac patients. Increased knowledge and motivation of staff to improve the quality of Cardiac imaging has a knock on effect of making the service more efficient allowing the department to increase the number of patients being imaged. As a result more patients are diagnosed earlier and preventative treatments can be commenced. The benefit will be evidenced through workload and throughput figures from Cardiac CT sessions. The revenue of the fund has already lead to teaching sessions and submission of numerous academic papers to local, national and international conferences. The purpose of the charity does not lead to any obvious harm. This however will be monitored. Audit of practice is performed regularly within the department. Patient feedback, compliments and complaints are regularly reviewed and reflected on. The charities beneficiary is primarily staff education within the Trust. This however has an effect on every patient within the Trust (and Northern Ireland) who is referred for a Cardiac CT. Outstanding staff skill and education will lead to lower radiation exposure and more diagnostic innovative CT scanning. No private benefit is envisaged.

What your organisation does

We will provide funds for staff to attend training and educational seminars to improve their skills.