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In 2024, we worked with colleagues, patients, communities and partners to refresh our organisational strategy. The result is our strategy, which takes its name from our vision statement: Healthier Together – Delivering Exceptional Care for All.
It sets out a clear, shared direction for Doncaster and Bassetlaw Teaching Hospitals – one that reflects national priorities, responds to local needs, and supports high-quality, safe and innovative care.
Built around four Strategic Priorities – Patients, People, Partnerships and Pounds – the strategy is supported by long-term ambitions and enabling strategies that guide how we deliver services, invest in our teams, reduce inequalities, modernise our infrastructure, and become more digitally enabled and research active.
You can explore the strategy in a short, accessible format below – or read the full document here.
Narrated summary
If you are short on time, below is a narrated summary outlined the key points of the document.
Introduction
At Doncaster and Bassetlaw Teaching Hospitals, we are proud to serve our patients and our communities with care that is compassionate, outstanding, and continually evolving.
In 2024, we worked closely with patients, colleagues, and partners to refresh our organisational Strategy – a shared commitment to a stronger, healthier future. Together, we have shaped a new direction that responds to national priorities, rising expectations, and the rapidly changing healthcare landscape.
Our Vision – Healthier Together – Delivering Exceptional Care for All – captures this renewed purpose, reflecting our drive to work together and deliver outstanding care for every patient. It speaks to the very heart of what we do, and why we do it: Providing safe, high-quality, and innovative care that makes a real difference to people’s lives.
This strategy builds on the DBTH Way and links in with wider NHS goals, including the priorities set out in the Lord Darzi report and the Government’s 2024 strategic shifts. It also aligns with the recently published NHS 10 Year Plan and ambitions of:
- Empowering people to take greater control of their health.
- Transforming care models to improve patient outcomes.
- Harnessing technology to drive innovation across the NHS.
We believe this is a once-in-a-generation opportunity. By embracing new ways of working, strengthening partnerships, and unlocking the creativity and expertise of our colleagues, we can not only respond to the challenges ahead but actively shape a better future for healthcare – for our Trust, our communities, and beyond.
This strategy sets out our key priorities and ambitions. It also represents an invitation: To dream bigger, to push further, and to deliver the very best care, together. By living our Values and leading with purpose, we will ensure that Doncaster and Bassetlaw Teaching Hospitals continues to be a place where patients thrive, colleagues grow, and communities are healthier, together.
Our Trust
We are an acute NHS Foundation Trust and Teaching Hospital, serving a diverse population of over 440,000 people across South Yorkshire, North Nottinghamshire, and surrounding areas. We provide a wide range of high-quality healthcare services through our three main hospitals – Doncaster Royal Infirmary, Bassetlaw Hospital, and Montagu Hospital – as well as additional outpatient and diagnostic services within external clinics.
As a teaching hospital, we proudly work closely with local universities, contributing to the development of future healthcare professionals while advancing research and innovation. Our links with Integrated Care Partnerships and system partners, spanning South Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire, enable us to deliver seamless, person-centred care in collaboration with other health and social care organisations.
With over 7,300 colleagues, our teams are united by the DBTH Way – our shared approach to delivering outstanding care. It’s built on our We Care Values of being kind, keeping respectful, and working together to give colleagues what they need to thrive.
This way of working is how we ensure safety, compassion and quality in everything we do, ultimately providing the best services for patients.
Achieving our vision
To achieve our vision, Healthier Together – Delivering exceptional care for all, we have adopted an approach that focuses on four Strategic Priorities, identified and developed with over 800 colleagues, patients, communities, and partners. Our four priorities describe our core focus as an organisation and they will never change.
Our Strategic Priorities are:
- Patients: We deliver safe, exceptional, person-centred care.
- People: We are supportive, positive and welcoming.
- Partnerships: We work together to enhance our services with clear goals for our communities.
- Pounds: We are efficient and spend public money wisely.
The priorities are underpinned by our Strategic Ambitions. Our Strategic Ambitions set out important work DBTH must do over time to improve how we provide care, make it sustainable for the future, and move closer to our vision.
Our Strategic Ambitions are:
- Provide the best care environments.
- Tackling Health Inequalities.
- Becoming a leading centre for research and education.
- Becoming a digitally enabled and mature organisation.
Our Strategic Priorities and Ambitions are also supported by Enabling Plans. Together they create a framework which outline the key principles, actions and work plans, driving us to achieve our vision.
Our Strategic priorities
To deliver on our vision, we focus on four core priorities: Patients, People, Partnerships and Pounds. These aren’t just headings – they shape how we work every day. In the sections that follow, we set out what each of these priorities means in practice, and the actions we’re taking to bring them to life.
Patients: We deliver safe, exceptional, person-centred care.
Delivering safe, exceptional, and person-centred care is the shared goal of everyone who works for and with DBTH.
This means a commitment to ensuring that patients can access timely, high-quality, person-centred care, with a particular focus on supporting those who face barriers to receiving the care they need.
Our approach focuses on delivering the right care, in the right place, in the best environment, to achieve the best possible outcome for every individual. This will include empowering patients to take an active role in their care, supported by digital developments.
We will:
- Improve timeliness and quality of care, reducing waiting times and ensuring patients are seen in the most appropriate setting for their needs.
- Deliver innovative treatments and research opportunities.
- Enhance care environments to ensure they are safe and welcoming.
- Ensure underserved communities receive the support they need to access services.
- Empower patients to take an active role in their care.
People: Fostering a supportive, positive and welcoming culture
Our people are the heart of the great care we give to patients. DBTH colleagues routinely show strength, innovation, and a strong commitment to providing exceptional care.
As healthcare changes, we are dedicated to creating a supportive and welcoming workplace. This means building inclusive practices, helping careers grow, and meeting modern needs like flexible working and new ways of delivering care.
We want our people to feel valued, confident, and prepared for today’s challenges and future goals, so they can thrive while providing outstanding care.
We will:
- Position DBTH as an employer of choice.
- Deliver the objectives of our People and Research and Innovation.
- Embed a culture of speaking up and inclusion.
- Further implement and embed talent management and succession planning.
Partnership: Collaborating to enhance our services
Providing high-quality, accessible, and lasting healthcare depends on strong partnerships across our system, including charities, social care, education institutes and beyond.
By working closely with others, we can improve services, find new solutions, and tackle the wider factors that affect our community’s health.
We will:
- Deliver seamless care that meets the diverse needs of our population, in the right place.
- Promote health education and prevention efforts aimed at improving health outcomes.
- Advance cutting-edge medical research, digital transformation, and evidence-based care.
- Leverage resources, expertise and funding from both public and private sectors.
Pounds: Ensuring efficiency and wise spending of public funds
To provide outstanding healthcare, we need a strong financial foundation that supports innovation, quality care, and long-term stability.
We are committed to managing our resources wisely, making the most of what we have, and seeking new funding through partnerships, innovation, and research
We will:
- Enhance operational efficiency, streamlining workforce processes, and improve procurement practices to reduce costs without compromising care quality.
- Diversify funding sources through grants, research collaborations, philanthropic efforts, value-based payment models, and public-private partnerships.
- Strategically direct funds toward digital transformation, modernising infrastructure, and implementing new care models that enhance efficiency, outcomes, and the experiences of both patients and colleagues.
- Align financial incentives with the delivery of the best patient outcomes, ensuring every pound is used for high-impact, cost-effective interventions
Strategic Wheel and Ambitions
The DBTH Strategic Wheel illustrates how our Strategic Priorities, Ambitions and Enabling Strategies interlock to guide our efforts and ensure a cohesive approach.
Strategic Ambitions: Provide the best care environments
Our ambition is to create high-quality care spaces by improving our buildings, changing how we deliver services, and working more closely with community healthcare, whilst also working towards Net Zero.
Our goal is to provide safe, modern facilities that reduce critical infrastructure risks, improve efficiency and bring services closer together. By designing spaces that maximise the use of new technology and support joined-up care, we can make sure patients get the right care in the right place reducing unnecessary hospital visits and focusing on keeping people well.
Recent developments at Bassetlaw Hospital and Montagu Hospital showcase how modern facilities can support care in the future. Our evolving vision will see some services (including ambulatory and elective care) provided in other settings, improving access to services, supporting our colleagues’ wellbeing, and easing pressure on the busy, aging, challenged DRI site, helping with its future redevelopment.
To achieve this, we must tackle challenges like securing funding, managing building work, and creating strong partnerships across services.
Our key deliverables include:
- Identifying opportunities for national programmes and capital funding.
- Achieving ‘Code Category B’ standards for all buildings, addressing structural risks.
- Delivering care closer to the community, reducing footfall on hospital sites where clinically appropriate.
- Co-locating services to enhance integrated pathways between primary and secondary care.
Strategic Ambitions: Tackling Health Inequalities
Tackling health inequalities is not just a priority – it is a principle embedded into everything we do. Our ambition is to place health equity at the core of every decision, ensuring that our services proactively address disparities, focus on prevention, and improve outcomes for the most disadvantaged groups.
By reducing the impact of lifelong illnesses, promoting early detection, and making sure every contact counts, we aim to transform the health landscape for those who need it most.
Success in this area requires robust infrastructure to track progress reliably and share data across organisations. This will allow us to identify areas of greatest need and focus our resources where they can make the most difference. By building capacity within the Trust, we aim to implement targeted initiatives that address the root causes of inequality while actively mitigating the risks of widening disparities.
Our key deliverables include:
- Embedding a framework to ensure every decision we make will be viewed through the lens of its impact on health inequalities.
- Working closely with partners, patients, and local communities to advance initiatives that prioritise prevention and quality improvement, ensuring that our services are inclusive, accessible and effective.
- Rolling out Health inequalities training to our colleagues and partners.
- Providing support and initiatives to achieve better health outcomes to colleagues who may face inequalities in health.
Strategic Ambitions: Becoming a leading centre for research and education
Our ambition will see the organisation become a leading centre for research and education, enhancing patient care and contributing significantly to healthcare innovation and professional development.
As the largest local employer, we support school age young adults in work experience through to specialist training, creating careers for life.
Success will be measured by clear outcomes that demonstrate our growth, impact, and readiness to meet the criteria defined by The University Hospitals Association (UHA).
Our key deliverables include:
- Maintaining and expanding student placements, in line with our workforce needs, providing positive experiences for learners, and establishing career pathways for all, including clinical academics.
- Invest in teaching and research facilities, secure additional funding streams, and develop infrastructure.
- Enhancing the research offer each year by expanding clinical trials, commercial opportunities, and funding grants.
Strategic Ambitions: Becoming a digitally enabled and mature organisation
We are committed to using digital technology to improve healthcare, making care better for patients, supporting our people, and working more efficiently.
By adopting new, patient-focused solutions, we aim to give everyone fair access to services, help patients manage their own care, and make work easier for our teams.
Our Digital Enabling Plan guides us in using technology to provide the best care, work closely with partners, and make the most of our shared resources. Digital innovation is key to everything we do at DBTH.
Our key deliverables include:
- Developing digital health literacy programmes to help patients confidently use online services and take an active role in their care.
- Expanding shared care records to improve data accessibility and collaboration with our partner organisations.
- Rolling out an electronic patient record (EPR) system across DBTH, enabling healthcare professionals to access accurate, up-to-date patient information to deliver timely and efficient care.
- Implementing artificial intelligence and remote monitoring tools to enhance diagnostic accuracy, enable proactive interventions, and reduce the burden on traditional healthcare settings.
Delivery timeline
The timeline below outlines the steps we are taking to achieve our Strategic Ambitions.
Enabling plans
Although presented as individual documents, our enabling plans are interconnected, with the Strategic Priorities and Strategic Ambitions acting as golden threads that integrate all actions towards a unified direction.
People: This plan ensures we can attract, recruit, and retain the best by being a welcoming and inclusive employer of choice within our local area. Aligned to the four pillars of the NHS People Plan, it focuses on improving the working lives and experiences of all our colleagues within Team DBTH
Estates and Net-Zero: Focused on improving and providing the best environments for both patients and colleagues, this plan ensures healthcare facilities meet the highest standards. It aligns with the Trust’s annual capital expenditure and includes a rolling programme of works to achieve these ambitions.
Health Inequalities: This plan addresses societal challenges and sets out plans for prevention, elective care pathways, urgent and emergency care, maternity and early life care, children and young people, and research and innovation. It also enhances awareness of health inequalities among our workforce and provides a framework for improvement.
Maternity: Aligning with national maternal and neonatal care themes, this plan integrates its actions with the Health Inequalities document. It supports vulnerable families, strengthens workforce retention and development, and improves patient experience through compassionate, person-centred care in a supportive environment.
Quality: Designed to deliver safe, exceptional, person-centred care, this plan outlines how systems and processes will ensure safety, quality, and effectiveness. It emphasises listening to feedback to provide compassionate, personalised care for all patients.
Quality Improvement and Innovation: Aligned with the NHS Impact model, this plan takes a holistic approach to improvement by building shared purpose, investing in culture and people, and developing leadership behaviours.
Speaking Up: Aligned with national principles, this plan outlines how we will listen to and support colleagues who need to speak up. Integrated with the People plan, it provides measurable actions to foster a listening, learning organisation and a more positive workplace for all.
Research and Innovation: This plan outlines our Vision to become a leading centre of research excellence. It supports the goal of achieving University Teaching Hospital status, growing research talent and increasing innovation capacity to secure grants and funding.
All of our plans can be viewed here: www.dbth.nhs.uk/about-us/how-we-are-run/trust-strategy/
Monitoring and evaluation
We evaluate our progress through established governance structures, using key performance indicators, data analytics, and regular reporting to ensure transparency and alignment with our goals. Enabling Plans are continuously refined based on feedback, outcomes, and emerging trends.
Glossary of terms
AI (Artificial Intelligence): Using computers for tasks like diagnostics, predictive analysis, and remote healthcare monitoring.
Code Category B Standards: For safe, high-quality healthcare facilities.
CQC (Care Quality Commission): Regulator ensuring health and social care services are safe, effective, and high-quality.
Digital Health Literacy: Patients’ ability to use digital tools and apps to manage their care.
Electronic Patient Record (EPR): A digital system for sharing accurate, up-to-date patient information.
Health Inequalities: Differences in health outcomes linked to social, economic, or demographic factors.
Integrated Care Board (ICB): NHS bodies coordinating health and care services for local areas.
Integrated Care Partnership (ICP): Collaboration between NHS, councils, and partners to improve care.
KPIs (Key Performance Indicators): Measures used to track progress towards specific goals.
Lord Darzi Report: A key report shaping NHS quality, safety, and innovation.
NHS Impact Model: A framework for NHS quality improvement and system change.
University Teaching Hospital Status: Recognition for hospitals leading in education, research, and training.
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