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Status: Operational tool · in development

Beds and capacity

Flow

Keeps patients close to home.

Flow gives bed managers and clinicians a real-time view of capacity and matches patients to the right bed, surfacing in-area options first so fewer people are sent far from family for care.

The problem

Every year, patients are sent hundreds of miles from home for a bed.

Inappropriate out-of-area placements cost the NHS around £164m a year and send patients away from family at their most vulnerable. Bed managers work from phone calls, spreadsheets and goodwill, with no real-time picture of where the right bed is.

£164m
a year on inappropriate out-of-area placements

How it works

From phone-around to a real-time match.

  1. 1

    See capacity live

    Flow shows occupancy and availability across wards and units in real time.

  2. 2

    Match the referral

    Clinical need is matched to suitable beds, with the constraints that matter surfaced.

  3. 3

    In-area first

    Suitable in-area options are shown first; out-of-area is flagged as a last resort.

  4. 4

    Track outcomes

    Out-of-area bed-days and placement outcomes are measured over time.

Concept preview · illustrative interface · not yet in clinical use

A first look at Flow.

An illustrative design, not live software. Synthetic data, and a clinician stays in control.

FlowConcept
Bed occupancy · today

Real-time capacity, matching patients to the right bed and helping keep them close to home.

Acute Ward A96%
Acute Ward B88%
PICU100%
Older adults74%

Capabilities

What Flow does.

Real-time occupancy

A live picture of beds across wards and units, not yesterday's spreadsheet.

Placement matching

Matches clinical need to suitable beds and surfaces the trade-offs.

Out-of-area flagging

Highlights out-of-area placements as the exception to avoid where possible.

Cost visibility

Makes the cost of each placement option visible at the point of decision.

Demand awareness

Helps teams anticipate pressure rather than only react to it.

Decision support

Equips the bed manager and clinician; it does not decide for them.

Built safe

The guardrails, by design.

  • People decide, not the tool

    Flow informs the bed manager and clinician. The placement decision stays with them.

  • Clinical suitability first

    Matching surfaces clinical suitability, never cost alone.

  • Built for the real workflow

    Designed around how bed management actually works, including the messy parts.

  • Measured honestly

    Out-of-area outcomes are tracked so impact can be evidenced, not assumed.

Regulatory position. Flow is an operational capacity tool rather than a clinical decision-making device. It is built to DSPT and UK GDPR standards and is in development. Any clinical-adjacent function is kept firmly in support of human decisions.

See Flow in a live demo.

We walk verified NHS and independent-provider teams through a clickable demo of the platform. Tell us about your organisation and we will set one up.

This page describes software in development. It is not a medical device and not for clinical use. Product screens are illustrative concepts using synthetic data.