{"id":7955,"date":"2018-09-19T10:45:32","date_gmt":"2018-09-19T09:45:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stockportccg.nhs.uk\/practicehub\/?page_id=7955"},"modified":"2019-02-19T12:44:18","modified_gmt":"2019-02-19T12:44:18","slug":"ambulatory-care-unit-acu","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.stockportpracticehub.co.uk\/practicehub\/local-services\/ambulatory-care-unit-acu\/","title":{"rendered":"Ambulatory Care Unit (ACU)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Following the recent pilot project at Stockport NHS Foundation Trust the Ambulatory Care Unit (ACU) has listened to feedback from Practices and implemented a number of changes.<\/p>\n<p>The ACU offers same-day emergency medical care for patients, to help manage a number of conditions which can be treated safely, often without requiring overnight stay in hospital \u2013 although it is not always possible for a patient to be discharged on the same day.<\/p>\n<p>ACU has the same access to clinical expertise and diagnostics as A&amp;E but with this new access pathway, the patient does not need to spend any time in A&amp;E.<\/p>\n<p><strong>ALL<\/strong> appropriate GP referrals in to this pathway <strong>will<\/strong> be accepted*. To enable this, the ACU has:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Expanded the unit to have greater capacity<\/li>\n<li>A Consultant\/Advanced Practitioner managing the ACU telephone at all times so if you get an engaged tone, try again in a few moments.<\/li>\n<li>A Consultant on Duty available to speak to a GP if they have an further queries with the agreed process for a patient, or would simply like advice and guidance that may avoid an admission altogether<\/li>\n<li>Protected appointment slots for GP Admissions<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong><em>\u00a0<\/em><em>*Patients requiring immediate attention or presenting life threatening symptoms will always be advised to attend A&amp;E through 999 conveyance. <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p><strong>How are appointment slots managed?<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A Consultant\/Advanced Practitioner will be available on ACU from 8am to provide advice and guidance which will in some instances avoid attendance at hospital altogether;<\/li>\n<li>Appointment slots will be protected in ACU for GP referrals for ambulatory and non-ambulatory patients for the in-hours period (8am and 6:30pm);<\/li>\n<li>ACU will arrange <strong>NWAS<\/strong> transport to bring patients into hospital in hours on behalf of Stockport primary care practices;<\/li>\n<li>Patients can be collected from an agreed place (practice\/own home) within a 1hr window;<\/li>\n<li>Patients who can make their own way will still be given an appointment time.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Please note that all patients sent to A&amp;E with a letter alone and no prior call to ACU first will receive a letter from the Trust reminding them of the new pathway.<\/p>\n<p>If you need to refer a patient to the ACU please call <strong>0161 419 4567.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Any patients requiring access to the ACU after 6.30pm will need to be managed in the normal way for out of hours.<\/p>\n<p><em>Meanwhile, if you require any further information please contact Jennifer Harrop, Associate Director Urgent Care via <a href=\"mailto:Jennifer.Harrop@stockport.nhs.uk\">Jennifer.Harrop@stockport.nhs.uk<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n   ","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Following the recent pilot project at Stockport NHS Foundation Trust the Ambulatory Care Unit (ACU) has listened to feedback from Practices and implemented a number of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":590,"featured_media":0,"parent":339,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"page-right-sidebar.php","meta":{"_bbp_topic_count":0,"_bbp_reply_count":0,"_bbp_total_topic_count":0,"_bbp_total_reply_count":0,"_bbp_voice_count":0,"_bbp_anonymous_reply_count":0,"_bbp_topic_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_reply_count_hidden":0,"_bbp_forum_subforum_count":0,"footnotes":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stockportpracticehub.co.uk\/practicehub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7955"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stockportpracticehub.co.uk\/practicehub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stockportpracticehub.co.uk\/practicehub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stockportpracticehub.co.uk\/practicehub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/590"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stockportpracticehub.co.uk\/practicehub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7955"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.stockportpracticehub.co.uk\/practicehub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7955\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9125,"href":"https:\/\/www.stockportpracticehub.co.uk\/practicehub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/7955\/revisions\/9125"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stockportpracticehub.co.uk\/practicehub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stockportpracticehub.co.uk\/practicehub\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7955"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}