Project updates

Here is where we share what we've done, what we are doing, and what we're planning next.

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Database work is getting underway

The data extract for our database work has been approved. Our work packages 2a, 2b, and 3a need some hospital's electronic health records to:

describe trends in health outcomes, both over time and between hospitals,
study the effect of SDEC services on policy outcomes and NHS costs, and
study how SDEC services have affected hospital admissions and the performance of emergency departments.

This database work is being facilitated by University of Sheffield's Data Connect, who provide secure access to sensitive data held in their accredited Secure Data Environment.

NHS plans to expand SDEC services

The UK government published their 10 Year Health Plan for England on the 3rd July 2025. The next 10 years should see an expansion of SDEC services nationally in a move toward same-day and out-of-hospital care. This pledge restates NHS England's Urgent and Emergency Care Plan 2025/2026, published in 6th June 2025.

We will have to wait and see if the pledge comes through and how it is implemented. In the meantime, our research project seeks to evaluate whether SDEC services to date have succeeded in the ultimate goal of reducing avoidable admissions and improving patient flow.

Quarterly Bulletin #3: July 2025

National survey is up and running

We have begun our national survey of type-1 emergency departments in NHS England. The purpose of the survey it to inform a taxonomy of the ways that SDEC services are setup and delivered.

Please, let us know if you can represent your type-1 emergency department in this national survey. Contact Ciarán McInerney at ciaran.mcinerney@sheffield.ac.uk.

Patients and staff tell us their thoughts on SDEC services

We had a productive and insightful meeting with the Sheffield Emergency Care Forum (SECF) Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) group, which generated valuable discussion around Same Day Emergency Care services (SDEC).

A key question during the meeting was whether SDECs are making access to urgent and emergency care more complex for patients when navigating emergency and urgent care.

Quarterly Bulletin #2: April 2025

Workshop on communication strategy

In our communications workshop, we developed a clear plan to engage our key audiences effectively throughout the project. This helped us refine our messaging, shape our website and launch our project bulletin. By taking a strategic approach, we ensure our research reaches the right people in meaningful ways.

The public tell us who SDEC patients are

We hosted our first workshop with patients and members of the public to describe the kinds of people best suited to SDEC services. We also met with members of the Deep End Research Alliance (DERA) to collaborate on a project about urgent care hubs.

Key themes were 'life context', 'Need to find out more', and 'Waiting for tests and test results'. Read more about the workshop.

Protocol for our literature review

We published the protocol for our literature review of SDEC services on ORDA, the University of Sheffield's Online Research Data Archive.

Stakeholder group workshop

We hosted our first workshop with representatives of healthcare and social-care services to identify who SDEC services might work well for and why.

Quarterly bulletin #1: January 2025

Project manger hired

We welcome Ciarán McInerney, PhD, to the team as our project manager. His previous roles included managing the Digital Innovation Theme in the NIHR Yorkshire & Humber Patient Safety Translational Research Centre.

Ciarán is also a research fellow with experience in heath-service research, electronic healthcare records, and performance analysis.

First meeting with our steering group

We met with 11 representatives from the NHS, Royal Colleges, the government, and academia. Our steering group are experts in urgent and emergency medicine, social care, civil service, data analysis, and public policy.

The group helped with our national survey of acute hospital trusts, and helped recruitment to our patient-and-public groups.

Work begins on the literature review

One of our first task is to compare the definitions, descriptions, and actual use of SDEC services.

We want to clarify and summarise what SDEC services are in the eyes of those who have already used and studied them.

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