Monthly archives: February 2019
Heartbeat: Friends and family test – help us to improve the patient journey
Our friends and family test (FFT) has been in place since 2013, in an effort to improve patient experience at our hospitals.
FFT was introduced by NHS England and was rolled out across the majority of NHS funded services in England.
The test gives all patients the opportunity to give anonymous feedback on the care and treatment they have received and allows us to continually improve the services we provide. Patients are asked one simple question:
‘How likely are you to recommend our ward/service to your friends and family if they needed similar care or treatment?’
They can rank their answer from ‘extremely likely’ to ‘extremely unlikely’ and can also make a comment to explain their ranking and tell us more about their experience.
In September last year we expanded the methods of how patients can complete the FFT, which now includes via SMS text messages and interactive voice messages, which has seen a steady increase in response rates.
Patient Experience Project Facilitator, Shila Patel explained more about the importance of the FFT.
“Since the introduction of the FFT, we have been able to make a number of changes which have improved our environment for patients,” said Shila.
“These changes have included things such as; introducing sleep packs for patients at night, using soft closing bins to reduce noise, better quality meals, cutlery and crockery and an improvement in communication between patients and colleagues.”
As well as the digital methods of completing the test, there are paper FFT postcards in all areas and completed ones should be returned to Shila to enable feedback to be collated and acted upon.
“Feedback needs to be seen by colleagues providing the care in as near to real time as possible,” said Shila.
“So please ensure you are returning the postcards as soon as possible, that way we can identify opportunities to make improvements that will really benefit our patients.”
Should you require further information or additional FFT postcards for your area, please contact shila.patel@nhs.net or call ext. 5188.
LGBT History Month – safe space provides confidential meeting place for LGBT colleagues
As you may be aware, February marked the start of LGBT History Month with this year’s theme being peace, activism and reconciliation.
To celebrate, we’re looking back at some of great achievements our of LGBT Staff Network at the Trust.
Back in February 2018, the staff network alongside the Trust introduced a new ‘safe space’ allowing colleagues from LGBT communities to be able to meet and talk confidentially. It was the first time that such a space had been offered to colleagues within our organisation.
Our LGBT staff network meets every two months to discuss upcoming news and events. An open invite is extended to all those who self-define as LGBT and allies.
Please see below upcoming meeting dates for 2019:
- 14 February, 10am-12pm, Sandwell Education Centre – Room 15
- 11 April, 2pm-4pm, City Hospital – Anne Gibson Committee Room
- 20 June, 10am-12pm, Sandwell Education Centre – Room 9
- 29 August, 2pm-4pm, City Hospital – Anne Gibson Committee Room
- 17 October, 10am-12pm, Sandwell Education Centre – Room 15
For more information, please contact swbh.lgbt@nhs.net.
Book your 2019 PDR review dates on Connect by 31 March
If you are a manager and have the responsibility for carrying out PDRs for your team it is important you schedule PDR dates to take place during the upcoming PDR cycle starting from 1 April-30 June.
Please see help sheet for more information.
If you are unable to schedule a review meeting for a team member you manage during the cycle, or you need further assistance booking PDR dates please email swbh.pdr@nhs.net and a member of the learning and development team will be in contact.
Drug safety notice – carbamazepine tablets shortage
There is currently a shortage of carbamazepine tablets. Be aware that patients who take these tablets must be referred to their specialist or GP for management of their epilepsy.
Please see Carbamazepine shortage information sheet for full details.
For more information please contact the pharmacy department on ext. 5259.
Equality and diversity classroom sessions cancellations
Due to unforeseen circumstances, some of our upcoming equality and diversity classroom sessions have been cancelled:
- 7 February – Post Graduate Centre, City
- 28 February – Education Centre, Sandwell
- 21-March – Education Centre, Sandwell
However, there are still sessions available. Please see the available drop-in sessions:
- 1 March – Anne Gibson Committee Room, City
- 5 March – Anne Gibson Committee Room, City
- 6 March – Room 9, Education Centre, Sandwell
- 11 March – Anne Gibson Committee Room, City
- 12 March – Anne Gibson Committee Room, City
- 13 March – Anne Gibson, Committee Room, City
- 18 March – Room 9, Education Centre, Sandwell
- 19 March – Room 9, Education Centre, Sandwell
- 20 March – Room 9, Education Centre, Sandwell
- 22 March – Room 15, Education Centre, Sandwell
For more information please contact learning and development on 0121 507 4794.
We apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused.
Chief Executive’s Message – Friday 8 February
On Monday our Full Dress Rehearsal (FDR) kicks in for Unity. You have been to the roadshows, maybe experienced the Pain and Gain events, definitely thought about the Play System, and probably been trained. FDR is our chance to test the product end to end. It is absolutely meant to help us spot issues and then fix them before we confirm go-live. I want to thank everyone involved in designing the run-through and putting time into it. Executive colleagues will be part of the testing process and you can see videos and other material about it in our communication bulletins.
Earlier today I signed the contract for our new N3 connections, which will go live during April. N3 has been the biggest single cause of IT instability over the last year, and we are investing not just in a new supplier but a hugely changed and larger connection. The NHS as a whole is changing these contracts and we have leapfrogged the queue to be ready in a few weeks’ time. I am aware that the weekly IT statistics I am sharing continue to show some frustrating figures. Plans to address the critical alerts and to tackle the backlog of incidents are due with me on Monday week, and the Board heard realistic optimism from Martin Sadler about those plans.
The Board did meet personally the paro-seals I wrote about last week. Ron Seal is imminent to complete the team. I don’t think we should have any awkwardness about embracing innovative ideas in our practice, and so I look forward to the seals being out and about. Equally excitingly Sarah Yusuf, our director of imaging services, pitched to the Board for support with a UK-leading set of partnerships around AI technologies to shorten diagnostic imaging test times and support quality in reporting. This may seem like Star Wars when PACs goes down or the link to neurosurgery is stalled, but it can offer us an edge, not just for our patients, but in recruiting staff, and so I am pleased we could get behind the work that John Morlese, Arvind Rajasekaran, Jonathan Walters and Sarah have been championing.
In the next week or so we have some big moments for public health in the Trust. We are fewer than five months away from Stop Day, when we switch off smoking across all our sites, and help colleagues to quit or to turn to vaping. Later in the month we confirm our approach to enforcement and to enticement. Shamelessly we want you to give up smoking. To be richer. And healthier. Please get alongside this campaign. We can change. At the same time, you know that we bid to restore school nursing to the portfolio of services we offer. The Trust provides midwifery and health visiting, one in six of our patients are with children and young people. If successful, we want to use the school nursing platform to work alongside teachers and parents to tackle mental wellbeing and obesity in our schools. Anyone with kids in schools in Sandwell will have an interest in our propositions: Watch this space!
By now you may have found those extra car parking spaces I advertised ten days ago. My thanks to Steve Clarke and his team for getting the paint out! In coming days, we go live with one of your ideas – reusable cups in our canteens and restaurants. Why not go out this weekend and buy yourself one? 20p off most hot beverages from our outlets when you do. And a little more space in the ocean as we tackle the scourge of waste and harm. Keep sending your suggestions in – from April my column in Heartbeat will have a regular plastics feature. I know lots of colleagues have great ideas about what we can do. Let me know. This is the longest of long term plans, but something we all have a part of play in doing.
I am definitely not ignoring emergency care in this message. Every week we seem to have a new push or project to help. We are seeing shifts where teams are clearly succeeding in meeting their own ambitions to improve quality of care. I want to emphasise that new projects and ideas are only ever a contribution to that effort, and that the energy and dedication of our teams remain the core of the effort. In March we see many more trainee doctors arrive in ED. New roles like flow coordinators are operating now. In most hours, on most days, the patients who arrive are about the number we would expect. Our drive must be to be ready and to try and end the risks to patients of being the slowly investigated or latterly diagnosed patient. Key to that work is moving patients definitely for admission (a minority) into our bed base. And key to that is early discharge or smart sitting out to free morning beds to patients into specialist beds in day light.
Finally, the Trust Board accepted an important paper on our welearn programme for 2019. You may know welearn either from QIHD accreditation, or from November’s poster contest. In the year ahead we will see a variety of developments to both ensure that we better find the learning from what we do, and better share and disseminate it. That is learning from error, but also from excellence, and we will adopt some of the projects seen latterly at the Children’s Hospital on that theme. In that spirit of learning, we also decided to undertake a look back enquiry into five maternal deaths in our Trust over the last eighteen months. The highest likelihood is that there is no similarity to be found in either cause or learning, but we want to look harder for similarity and ensure we have distilled the learning. No-one has told us to do that, and the investigation is not a holding position while we narrate uncomfortable news. It is what we do, I think, as a leadership community, which is to face openly the issues that arise in providing high risk care, and look to see how we can gain improvements for our patients. I very much hope colleagues within maternity services have access to all the help and support they need as we work to learn from recent fatalities. Both Paula Gardner, our chief nurse, and I have written to colleagues to that effect, and I want to repeat that offer here.
#hellomynameisToby
Palliative care ethical and spiritual needs learning – seeing the person behind the patient
Our palliative care team will be organising training focussing on ethical considerations and spiritual needs in palliative care for registered nurses, medics and AHPs on Wednesday 3 April, 9.30am-11.45am, Sandwell Education Centre – Room 12-13.
The training, ‘seeing the person behind the patient’ will be facilitated by Dr Mike Blaber.
Note: Places will be allocated on a first come first serve basis.
For more information or to book on this course, please contact paulroberts6@nhs.net or call 0121 507 3611.
January 2019- QIHDs
Chief Operating Office
Primary Care, Community and Therapies
Medicine and Emergency Care
Surgery
Pathology
Imaging
Women and Child Health
Estates
Nursing and Facilities
Operations
Chief Executive
Medical Directors Office
Workforce and OD
Financial Management
Primary Care, Community and Therapies
Medicine and Emergency Care
Surgery
Imaging
Women and Child Health
Estates
Nursing and Facilities
Operations
Chief Executive
Medical Directors Office
Workforce and OD
Financial Management
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