The Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) recently launched an Acute Kidney Injury (AKI) Toolkit for GPs and healthcare professionals. The toolkit was developed in partnership with Think Kidneys; NIHR CLAHRC Greater Manchester; Kent, Surrey, Sussex Academic Health Science Network (KSS AHSN); and North East and North Cumbria Academic Health Science Network (AHSN NENC). NHS Education for Scotland, Healthcare Improvement Scotland and the NIHR Greater Manchester Patient Safety Translational Research Centre (NIHR GM PSTRC) have also contributed to development of the toolkit. It aims to improve the recognition, response and management of AKI in primary care.
AKI is a major barometer of patient safety across the UK, with NHS England specifying it as a priority to delivering the vision of the Five Year Forward View. Illness complicated by AKI costs around 1% of the NHS budget and is associated with poor health outcomes in terms of high rates of rehospitalisation, progression and mortality. It is associated with approximately 1 in 5 unplanned hospital admissions and an estimated 100,000 deaths per year.
The AKI toolkit provides resources including national guidance, case studies and shared learning about quality and safety issues to improve patient safety in general practice. AKI offers a lens to improve patient safety for people with a range of conditions, particularly those taking multiple medicines and living with complex health and social care needs (that is, multimorbidity). By focusing on AKI there are opportunities to improve medication, safer transitions of care and safety for vulnerable patients and their carers.
View the Acute Kidney Injury Toolkit at www.rcgp.org.uk/aki