Two Airedale Hospital staff members have won awards for their work to streamline procedures to ensure patients are treated more quickly and effectively.

Sue Speak, head of service improvement at Airedale NHS Foundation Trust, and Richard Wylde, service improvement manager at the hospital, received their double accolade from the Lean Healthcare Academy, a division of the Ilkley-based Virtual College.

Lean is a set of principles developed for the workplace, designed to cut down on waste while improving the level of service for the patient or client.

Mr Wylde was named Lean Champion of the Year for his work with the trust’s maternity unit. His winning citation explains: “A great success of Richard’s has been with the community midwives, significantly reducing the number of faxes sent, saving 355 working hours.

“These hours have been put back into the service, ensuring all women now get a full 28-week appointment and all follow up appointments have been increased by five minutes.”

Ms Speak received a special award for her outstanding contribution over a number of years to the overall Lean initiative.

Her citation praised her positive mental attitude, determination to succeed, her willingness to help others and ability to remain calm in a crisis.