In partnership with directorates, the Governance Support Team will mitigate risks by checking that:

• evidence has been used to develop the guidance.
• the impact on other services and individuals has been considered.
• a consultation with stakeholders has been completed.
• a plan for testing, implementing and monitoring of the implementation of the guidance has been considered and developed (as appropriate to the guidance)

The Governance Support Team will check to ensure that the following activities have taken place prior to publication:

• Resource discussed and agreed with appropriate clinical team.
• Equality and Diversity Impact Assessment completed (by the guidance developer)
• Consultation including impact on other services.
• Service Governance Group/other Specialist Committee endorsement.
• Overarching Governance Steering Group endorsement.

The newly approved clinical guidance documents of the Service /Directorate Governance Group / Mental Health Clinical Documentation Steering Group or Specialist Committee meeting where the guidance has been endorsed will be sent to the Governance Support Team. The new guidance document will then be uploaded to AthenA and sent to the Right Decisions Team for digitisation.

The Governance Support Team will provide support on the process, identify the review date of all guidance, inform clinicians when a review date is approaching and ensure there are no out of date clinical guidance documents on the NHS Ayrshire and Arran AthenA site and Right Decisions website.

If any guidance documents are  identified as being out of date this will be annotated “under review” until clarification is received as to whether or not the guidance remains necessary.

The Right Decisions Team is responsible for creating and revising content on the Right Decisions platform subject to appropriate governance approval and receipt of the guideline submission form if required (depending on content type).

They can advise enquirers on how to have content added to Right Decisions and direct them to Governance Support for assistance on submission and approval of guidelines and pathways. 

Contact aa.RightDecisions@aapct.scot.nhs.uk for further information.