Post by Megan Fallows

I am so grateful to have received the William & Edith Ryman prize, which was awarded to the student with the best Quality Improvement Project (QIP) in Year 6. This is a great honour and I am very grateful to the UCL Medical School Faculty for this award. The aim of my QIP was 'to improve appropriate use of faecal immunochemical testing (FIT) in people <50'. Despite bowel cancer being the 4th most common cancer in the UK, only 55% of units within the NHS correctly meet the cancer 2-week wait targets, hence I wanted to study why people were being tested who did not meet the criteria. I retrospectively analysed EMIS data at the GP practice, identified potential root causes, and produced a leaflet to circulate to the doctors to highlight the criteria and the importance of coding results. We recorded the number of patients <50 who had a FIT test in the month following this teaching, and saw a dramatic decrease. I presented my first cycle of the QIP at the practice meeting to all of the staff, and we discussed the importance of these results and how it would be useful to repeat a second cycle and use a longer timeframe in the future to monitor long term outcomes for these patients. Thank you to the medical school for giving me the opportunity to undertake this project, and thank you to my incredible supervisor Dr Lance Saker for your time and support.