Case Study: Council's Adoption of Microsoft 365 Copilot and Prism
Carmarthenshire County Council, a prominent local authority in Wales, accelerated its digital transformation by harnessing the combined strengths of M...
The Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM) is the professional body responsible for supporting Emergency Medicine in the UK. RCEM sets clinical standards, provides education and training, and drives quality improvement initiatives to enhance patient care across Emergency Departments nationwide.
RCEM encountered major setbacks with its previous supplier, including incomplete functionality and data loss, which hindered progress and affected organisational credibility.
- Customer: Royal College of Emergency Medicine (RCEM).
- Project: Microsoft Power BI Report Build using Microsoft Fabric (Data and Analytics team).
- Engagement: Initially donated charity days, transitioned into a paid engagement with a future roadmap for additional development and advisory work.
The Challenge
To regain control of their data, RCEM decided to build its portal and dashboard in-house, but lacked the technical expertise to create an interactive, user-friendly dashboard. This gap led them to partner with Trustmarque for a Power BI solution built on Microsoft technology.
“We wanted to make a dashboard that was more interactive, that was better than the previous dashboard, but we didn’t have the knowledge and the skill to build it. That’s where Trustmarque’s Power BI Consultants stepped in.”
Emily Lesnik, Clinical Quality Manager
Key Challenges:
- Client wanted significant improvements over its existing product. Data loss incidents posed operational and reputational risks.
- Limited in-house dashboard development skills.
- Need for a secure, interactive dashboard tailored to hospital emergency department requirements.
As part of Trustmarque’s social responsibility program, each employee receives two charity days per year to support a chosen charity. The data and analytics team chose to pool their days to assist RCEM, a registered charity supported by Her Royal Highness the Princess Royal. This aligns closely with their ongoing work using Power BI and Fabric to improve patient safety in the NHS and social care.
The Solution
Trustmarque designed and implemented a Power BI dashboard, initially leveraging voluntary hours as part of its corporate volunteering policy before moving to a formal engagement. The team worked closely with RCEM to clarify requirements, advised on best practices, and recommended Power BI and Fabric as the optimal solution. As Emily explains, “The Trustmarque Data and AI team clarified our needs and guided us on what was possible, which helped shape our solution.”
James Charlton, Power BI Consultant at Trustmarque, added: “Our approach to building the dashboard delivers a powerful, game-changing experience, offering a dynamic, top-level executive snapshot that users can instantly drill into. With just a few clicks, user can dive deep into individual KPIs and uncover meaningful trends and insights over time.”
To guarantee long-term success and independence, Trustmarque facilitated training and knowledge transfer, enabling RCEM’s team to confidently operate and maintain the dashboard after implementation. Security was a priority, with row-level security features put in place so clinicians could only access data relevant to their own hospital, while also providing flexible options for multi-hospital access when needed. This collaborative approach laid the foundation for a long-term partnership.
Key Outcomes:
- Interactive Power BI dashboards with detailed performance breakdowns.
- Data quality monitoring tools allowing users to identify and correct missing cases.
- Secure login integrated with RCEM’s CRM system for 500 users.
- Row-level security so clinicians only see their hospital data.
- Ability to benchmark against national figures for comparison.
- Scalability to add new Quality Improvement Projects (QIPs) annually, starting with adolescent mental health, followed by Care of Older People, Time‑Critical Medications.
Impact
The project marked a pivotal transformation, shifting from an incomplete and non-operational product to a fully functional dashboard. This advancement now provides users with comprehensive, aggregated insights across all existing QIPs, with the capability to expand and include additional projects in the near future. The result is a powerful tool that equips users with the complete data view necessary for effective decision-making and performance monitoring:
Key Outcomes:
- Transitioned from a non-functional product to a robust, working dashboard.
- Enhanced data visibility and ownership for hospitals.
- Improved governance and reporting capabilities for NHS and regulatory bodies.
- Established a long-term partnership model for future dashboard builds.
- Automated data visualisation reduces manual reporting effort, freeing up time for clinical teams.
Future Plans
RCEM plans to continue working with Trustmarque to add new dashboards annually, leveraging the existing platform and accumulating knowledge for faster delivery and improved design.
The dashboard architecture supports future QIP topics and advanced analytics, ensuring long-term value and adaptability.
RCEM are running a series of national initiatives, called QIPs that are aimed at improving patient safety in every emergency department in the UK in a measurable and sustainable way.
The initial area of focus are:
- Time critical medication
- Care of older people
- Mental health - In order to track and measure the improvements in patient safety, data has to be collected, assessed for quality, stored, organised and securely fed back to each organisation so they can monitor progress against these safety critical initiatives.