For many NHS estates teams, the biggest barrier to effective decision-making is not a lack of data but the fact that critical information sits across disconnected legacy systems, spreadsheets, drawings and paper-based workflows.
Trailblazing trusts are starting to bring their fragmented data together in one digital system, allowing them to see how everything is connected, making it easier to understand buildings and assets and make better decisions.
This location-based view helps answer the questions that matter most: where is poor asset condition creating the highest risk? And where are the largest maintenance backlog challenges?
Turning risk into action
At Airedale General Hospital, in a UK first, geospatial technology replaced a manual, paper-based survey process, improving RAAC management and helping maintain the hospital’s safe operation.
Using iPads and indoor mapping, inspections are now 50% more efficient, saving time and money while improving safety. The digital approach gives the trust a single, joined-up view of risk, instantly showing on a map where maintenance and repairs will have the greatest impact.
Using iPads and indoor mapping, inspections are now 50% more efficient
But RAAC is just the first step. Almost any type of asset can be monitored and managed using a similar approach, from fire doors to asbestos, electrical systems to plumbing.
A bird’s eye view
Airedale has now extended the approach by adding high-resolution drone imagery to its geospatial system. With the largest flat roof in the NHS, covering 30,000 square metres, the aerial images add a vital layer of intelligence by giving teams a clear, current view of hard-to-access areas so they can assess condition faster, identify potential issues and prioritise maintenance work.
Drone imagery also reduces the need for scaffolding and routine physical surveys, making inspections safer, faster and more cost-effective, reserving on-site inspections for more complex situations.
But the full potential of drone imagery is realised when it is connected to the rest of the spatial view of the estate. It can help trusts better understand asbestos, energy performance, solar potential, fire risk, heatwave exposure and other asset risks in context. The value lies in seeing these issues together.
Digital twin
The same principle applies to wider estate transformation: everything in a healthcare estate happens somewhere, making location a natural common thread to combine complex data into a single view so staff can better understand it.
This is exactly what Manchester University NHS Foundation Trust (MFT) have done. The estates team is creating a ‘smart estate’ with a digital twin.
The initial drivers for this were workshops, revealing that the biggest challenge for staff was finding consistent, up-to-date and trusted information quickly enough to support decisions about space, risk and maintenance priorities.
Location: the missing link
Today, the Trust can visualise buildings, floors, rooms and space in detail, with the associated information, including CAFM data, CAD drawings, compliance data, maintenance schedules, asbestos and RAAC information.
By placing data into a digital twin, one of the first revelations is a dramatically improved understanding of space – knowing how many rooms and spaces a trust owns, what they’re used for and who is responsible for them. MFT now has this information at their fingertips.
New applications for asset and condition management involve digital surveys on mobile devices, which feed directly into the digital twin and visualise different types of risk levels. Digitising the building condition surveys to help tackle the maintenance backlog are already well under way.
Project managers working on construction and maintenance projects are also seeing major efficiency benefits. Instead of spending days gathering information from multiple teams and making repeated site visits, they can now use the digital twin to select the rooms involved, calculate floor areas, check asbestos information, review photographs, etc.
Hospital 2.0
What MFT has achieved is just the beginning.
The team’s work demonstrates how a digital twin can move from an estates data platform to a strategic planning tool. Once the core understanding of space is established, trusts can layer in more operational, financial and clinical data to support better long-term decisions. Their digital twin is currently supporting the early-stage project planning for the North Manchester General Hospital (NMGH) New Hospital Programme.
From reactive to ready
For NHS estates leaders looking to reduce operating costs, tackle infrastructure risk and make better use of the data they have, taking a digital approach can be a practical route to safer, faster and more strategic decision-making.
Some trusts are already showing how geospatial technology can improve estates management by making space, assets, risk and maintenance priorities easier to understand. As digital maturity increases, best-practice models will emerge that help more hospitals move from reactive estate management to more intelligent, evidence-led planning.
Author: Duncan Booth, Head of Health and Social Care at Esri UK
