Monthly archives: October 2018

National speak up month – meet our Freedom to Speak up Guardians

We are supporting national speak up month a national campaign by the National Guardian’s Office, which calls on NHS organisations to increase awareness of how colleagues can raise concerns at work.

Our Freedom to Speak up Guardians are available all year round to hear your concerns. These are the people who you can turn to if you want to talk about issues you feel need addressing.

The Guardians have received specialised training and are well placed to listen to issues and guide concerned colleagues on the best way to resolve problems. This in turn will provide better care for our patients.

Click here to find out more about your Freedom to Speak Up Guardians.

Click here to meet your Freedom to Speak Up Guardians.

RCN Local Learning Event – Just Ask – Could This Be Sepsis?

Sepsis claims thousands of lives every year – more than breast cancer, bowel cancer, prostate cancer and HIV/AIDS combined.

Sepsis is a life-threatening condition arising when the body’s dysregulated response to infection causes injury to its tissues and organs.

This practical workshop, presented by Georgina McNamara, Executive Lead Nurse for Education at UK Sepsis Trust, aims to:

• bring together healthcare professionals to shape better sepsis care
• help you recognise the signs and symptoms of sepsis
• ensure you understand ‘the sepsis six’, and how the timely delivery of these simple interventions improves patient outcome.

The Learning Event is free for RCN members, while non-members will be charged £20 + VAT – this fee will be reimbursed if the attendee joins the RCN on the day.

You can book online for this event by following this link.

The workshop will be followed by the RCN Birmingham West and Sandwell Annual General Meeting, where you can get involved in shaping the future of your branch, have your say on how your local branch is run, and learn more about the activities the branch undertakes.

Star Awards – 2020 Vision Prize for Integrated Care Pioneer of the Year and Local Primary Care Award for the Most Valued Service

Our annual Star Awards took place on Friday 12 October, with over 350 colleagues in attendance. It was a fantastic evening, celebrating everything that is good about our organisation.

This year’s 2020 Vision Prize for Integrated Care Pioneer was won by the Lawrence Kelly, Learning Works Centre Coordinator and the Local Primary Care Award for the Most Valued Service was awarded to our respiratory consultants.

Lawrence joined our organisation 15 years ago and worked as a training and development assessor in learning and development, supporting accredited staff progression and classroom based learning.

Later in his career, Lawrence took the opportunity to coordinate the newly formed learning hub, the Learning Works.  It has gone from strength to strength over the last five years, with innovative projects, many attracting external funding to make an impact in our local community and providing support, advice and guidance around development for our colleagues.

The respiratory medical team is made up of nine consultants, who work across both City and Sandwell Hospital.

During the last year, the team has embraced many important changes to the benefit of patients. They created a dedicated non-invasive ventilation unit at Sandwell Hospital and they were the first medical specialty to implement the consultant of the week model.

The team are also exploring new ways of with the GPs and integrated care, which opens up many new possibilities of looking after patients different and effectively. The team was selected as one of the Royal College of Physicians ‘Future Hospital Project’ sites which also led to them being shortlisted for a Health Service Journal award.

Check out the videos below to find out why Lawrence and the respiratory consultants were recognised for outstanding commitment.

LGBT Staff Network Celebrates National Coming Out Day 2018

Happy National Coming Out Day

The LGBT Staff Network is highlighting the importance of the National Coming Out Day it is celebrated on October 11th on a yearly basis. It grows and becomes more well known every single year. National coming out day is a time for those in the LGBT community to finally be open about who they are to their friends, family and the world!

There is no right or wrong time to come out, just your time, do it when it’s right for you, not for when other people want you to, because it’s your journey, your life, live it for you! not for somebody else.

We are very #PROUD of an organisation that has a dedicated inclusion pledge for its staff and patients around LGBT Inclusion, the pledge states :-

Creating a culture where it is safe to be ‘out’ at SWBH as a staff member or a patient

•Raise awareness and support Lesbian Gay Bisexual Trans (LGBT) network
•Attend Birmingham Pride for recruitment and awareness raising
•Join Stonewall and take part in regional conferences and workshops
•Train staff in supporting LGBT patients sensitively and appropriately
•Create a ‘Safe Space’ for LGBT colleagues
•Work with Birmingham LGBT and other external partners to ensure best practice is being implemented
•Work with Staff-side, to support LGBT staff at work
•Celebrate LGBT History Month with events and support in February 2018
•Implement ‘Allies’ programme for non LGBT staff communicated and visible
•Increase sexual orientation declaration to at least 20 per cent in two years
•Independent review and audit by Stonewall UK of Trust, ready to enter ‘Top 100’ in 2019

#NationalComingOutDay

Heartbeat: New hub helps hospital visitors find their way

A new initiative has been launched to help thousands of patients and visitors navigate their way around City Hospital. The opening of the Volunteer and Charity Hub has been heralded as an important step to launch a new ‘meet and greet’ scheme at the site.

The hub acts as a base for wayfinding volunteers, who aim to guide patients and visitors to their intended destination. Volunteers will also play an important role in raising the profile of our charity work.

Johnny Shah, Head of Your Trust Charity, said: “We are delighted to fund the ‘meet and greet’ scheme as we know that this project will enhance our patients and visitors’ experience.

“We understand that it can be challenging for patients and visitors to find their way when visiting our hospitals. Whilst maps and signage act as reference, not every visitor is comfortable or able to use the maps to get across what is a very large and spread out hospital site, with some buildings dating back to 1887.

“This is especially true for first time visitors who have no knowledge gained from previous visits to the site. This scheme offers us the opportunity to greet visitors in a more welcoming and consistent way, whilst helping them get to where they need to be. Having the volunteer hub at City Hospital is the first key step to achieving this goal.”

Patricia Hunt, Volunteer Service Manager, added: “We are pleased to be delivering this project and grateful for the support from Your Trust Charity.

“We are also thankful to our wayfinding volunteers as without them, this project would not be possible.

“We are still recruiting more volunteers. So if anyone would like to spare a few hours per week to support our patients and visitors, please contact us.”

To find out more about volunteering go to www.swbh.nhs.uk/services/volunteers-service/.

Early intervention referral questionnaire

We support colleagues who may benefit from early intervention services, therefore expediting hospital appointments, whether it is a surgical procedure or an investigation.

Early intervention services may help you receive your treatment in a timely manner, and you may gain more immediate access to health services provided by the Trust. However, requesting these services does not guarantee that you will be seen any sooner and does not imply immediate or unrestricted access to services.

Colleagues can refer themselves by completing the early intervention questionnaire Early Intervention Questionnaire. Choose the “Early Intervention into SWBH Patient Services” from the drop down menu.

Please be aware that to enable us to monitor the effectiveness of this service, the occupational health and wellbeing service will require some information from you, which we will pass on to your physician/department.

Note: We’re unable to action your request, unless you provide us with all of the details requested. Questions that are marked with an asterisk (*) are mandatory questions and must be answered.

Mandatory training – data security awareness

New dates are now available for dedicated training sessions for the mandatory training – data security awareness courses.

For booking and more information, please contact karen.morsley@nhs.net

Fighting flu by coming to you

Our FluMobile will be out and about from this week, visiting of community sites to recruit more Jedi’s to our force as we continue our battle against the dark side.

On Wednesday 24 October, the FluMobile will be in the following locations:

• 9.20am – Victoria Health Centre, Smethwick – on site for 25 minutes
• 1.30pm – The Lyng Health Centre, West Bromwich – on site for 20 minutes

Please note that these are approximate times of arrival.

No appointment is necessary, just drop in when the FluMobile is at your base – you must show your Trust ID card to be eligible for your vaccination.

SWBH Influenza Immunisation Questionnaire

Note: The flu vaccine does not contain any pork or meat product or derivatives.

Star Awards – Patient Safety Award and Excellence in Research

Our annual Star Awards took place on Friday 12 October, with over 350 colleagues in attendance. It was a fantastic evening, celebrating everything that is good about our organisation.

This year’s Patient Safety Award was won by the Safety Plan Project Team and the Excellence in Research prize was awarded to Kanthan Theivendran, Consultant Orthopaedic and Upper Limb Surgeon.

The safety plan was introduced in January last year as part of a drive to improve safety, quality and care, as well as to improve patient experience and engagement and change the culture of our clinical workforce.

One of the main reasons the plan was introduced was because patients didn’t always know their care pathway or plan of care and data showed there was a poor completion of fundamental clinical assessments and documents.

As a result of the safety plan, we have seen a reduction in falls by 58 per cent and patients are now at the centre of their care plans.

Kanthan started as a consultant in trauma in orthopaedics in February 2016 specialising in upper limb surgery. During his training, Kanthan always had a keen interest in research and has published a number of clinical studies in national and international peer reviewed journals.

He wanted to continue his research interests at our organisation and was given an opportunity to represent the surgery directorate by sitting on the research and development committee.

He is the principal investigator in a number of orthopaedic trials – a first within the trauma and orthopaedic department. Kanthan is always looking to encourage colleagues and trainees to collaborate on these existing trials that ultimately lead to an improvement in patient care.

Check out the videos below to find out why the Safety Plan Project Team and Kanthan were recognised for outstanding commitment.