Monthly archives: June 2019
Cardiology diagnostics fax switch off: 28 June
The Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, Matt Hancock has ordered a complete phase out of faxing in the NHS by April 2020.
NHS organisations will be required to use modern communication methods, such as secure email, to improve patient safety and cyber security. Information can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/news/health-and-social-care-secretary-bans-fax-machines-in-nhs.
With this in mind, cardiology diagnostics will be switching off their fax machines on 28 June.
Therefore they will not be able to receive correspondence regarding Diagnostic tests for; 12 Lead ECGs, ambulatory monitoring and echocardiograms through fax. Instead correspondence needs to be via email to swbh.cardiology-diagnostics-clerical-team@nhs.net. This email address can be used for both City and Sandwell patients.
Note: You will still be able to request diagnostic tests via ICM and reports will be available on CDA as normal.
For any consultant related correspondence please contact the cardiology secretaries via switchboard.
Help informatics with S: Drive tidy up
Informatics are encouraging you to tidy up your S:drives.
A prize is on offer to individuals who can find and delete their largest unnecessary file and the oldest unnecessary file. The prize will be a replacement computer and screen for your department and or area.
The S: drive is no place for personal data, usernames and passwords or identifiable patient data. It should also not be the home of unnecessary and out of date information.
Principles for the S: drive include:
- Organise your S: drive sensibly
- Remove personal and patient data to somewhere more appropriate
- Get rid of unnecessary historic files
Note: Be sure to check with your teams before deleting anything. In the search box type size:huge to find really big files.
For more information please call ext. 4050.
Cancer services seeking raffle and tombola donations for annual cancer fair
Do you have any new, unused items at home that could be used to support our cancer fair raffle and tombola? The fair is being held for 300 patients and carers at West Bromwich Albion Football Club on Saturday 6 July.
The service are seeking brand new, unused items for our prize events including gifts, toys and household items as well as bottles for the ‘ bottle tombola!’
Donated prizes can be dropped off to the courtyard cancer information and support services at Sandwell and the main stores at City. Please drop any prizes off before Friday 26 June clearly marking items as ‘donations for cancer fair.’
For further information please call ext 2525.
The cancer fair committee would like to express their sincere thanks to everyone who kindly donated nail varnish for our event. We received an overwhelming response and now have more than enough varnish to go round on the day with plenty of colour variations for our nail painters to use. Thank you all for your continued support.
Disability and long term conditions staff network meeting: 21 June
The next meeting of the disability and long term conditions staff network takes place on Friday 21 June.
Time: 10am – 12pm
Venue: Education Centre – room 9, Sandwell Hospital
All colleagues are welcome to attend regardless of whether they have a disability or long term condition.
For more information please contact andrew.mould@nhs.net or richard.burnell@nhs.net.
Calling your patient groups! Join our new Community Involvement Forum
We are putting together a new group for patients, chaired by Paula Gardner, our chief nurse to look at how we can better engage with patients, families and carers and improve people’s experience of our services.
We know that there are lots of specialty-specific patient groups who meet regularly to provide support and to feedback on how their services work.
So that we can ensure all existing patient groups are represented in this new forum, if you are aware of a patient group within your service or specialty please can you pass on a lead contact name to swbh.comms@nhs.net and we will be able to invite them and a couple of other group members to our inaugural meeting that is planned for July.
Heartbeat: Wave goodbye to… Olwen Dutton
Olwen Dutton has paid tribute to colleagues as her role as deputy chair came to an end in May.
Joining the Trust’s board in 2010, Olwen has been a familiar face around our workplace. She said: “I have enjoyed every moment of my time here and I am overwhelmed by the dedication shown by the staff to the patients.
“One of the things I’ve really enjoyed has been working on the quality agenda. I have been chairing the quality and safety committee for some years now and it’s been tremendous.
“What I have really witnessed over those nine years is a change in focus, so that we put the quality and care that we give our patients at the heart of what we do – and I’m sure that the Trust will continue to do that.”
Olwen is currently a partner with Birmingham–based Anthony Collins Solicitors LLP, and specialises in local government and other public sector work.
During her time at SWB Olwen’s responsibilities included chair of the Quality and Safety Committee and member of the Audit Committee.
Olwen added: “I am sorry to be leaving, but it’s a great place and everyone who works here really deserves my congratulations for the dedication that they give on a daily basis.”
Three weeks to go smokefree
With only three weeks to go before our Trust goes smokefree on 5 July, we’ve asked colleagues, visitors and patients about why it matters. Here is what Tracey Moore, Holistic and Beauty Therapist said: “My work focusses on helping colleagues achieve wellbeing, so I fully support the ban as it means we will not be breathing in secondhand smoke as we walk around the hospital sites.”
BME Staff Network Windrush garden party: 23 June
In celebration of national Windrush day, The BME Staff Network will be hosting a Garden Party on Sunday 23 June at Soho House, Soho Avenue, off Soho Road, Handsworth B18 5LB.
To book your tickets, please click here.
Please see poster below for more information:
Lewisham at Dartmouth Golf Course discount for Trust colleagues
Lewisham at Dartmouth Golf Course are offering up to 10 per discount for Trust colleagues.
Note: They will also be hosting a networking event on Thursday 20 June where attendees can find out more about all the discounts available to them.
For more information regarding staff benefits on offer please contact amir.ali1@nhs.net.
Chief Executive’s Message – Friday 14 June
Come to our Annual General Meeting on Thursday 20 June at 6pm to hear about the Trust’s achievements throughout the year, and from Dr Arvind Rajasekaran who is talking about clean air and respiratory medicine.
It was wonderful last weekend to hear that Elaine Newell’s longstanding, and significant, contribution to nursing and midwifery at the Trust, and to the care of babies and their families, had been recognised in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list with the award of her OBE. Within our Trust we have so many people who go above and beyond – and our Star Award nominations are still open for a few more days – but Elaine stood out, not just in my own view, but in the eyes of many colleagues to whom I know she would pay tribute in light of this recognition.
Yesterday our finance team picked up an award at the HFMA ceremony – this was for their resilience. Resilience is, remarkably, precisely the leadership competency I talked about in our annual conference ten days ago, and I am delighted a team that has helped us to have strong financial discipline has been recognised. That discipline allows us to pay for things that matter to patients and to colleagues; investments like the new gym refurbishment at City, extra security lights by Postgrad, or the devices for Unity that will be arriving in droves come early August. Congratulations to Dinah and her team – and I know that the frustrations of Oracle are top of the list to tackle this summer!
Here and in Heartbeat you will have read a lot about our imaging transformation. New scanners are on en route to the BTC for early autumn. Last month; we managed our best ever turnaround times from referral to report. By August our MRI service will go genuinely seven day. And our Board has agreed a set of changes to bring artificial intelligence technologies into the department before the end of the year as well. One key turnaround time we are trying to all work together to change is for urgent and A&E related patients, and this week the “Rad Ready” standards were launched by John Morlese, our clinical director for the diagnostic imaging directorate. At the same time, there is some tremendous effort going on trust-wide to ensure we implement our results acknowledgement standard for all imaging reports issued after 1 April, as well as some historic reports. David Carruthers and I will be in touch shortly with clinicians who are leading the way, as well as meeting individually with a handful of colleagues who have not yet had chance to apply the new safety standard in their practice. Results acknowledgement omissions lie at the heart of at least half a dozen serious incidents in our care over the last three years. Unity gives us a much more user friendly set of arrangements from October, and we are working now to get our house in order before go-live.
The treatment of local residents impacted by the scandal over immigration policy last year continues to be a source of real concern. At the same time we are again supporting Windrush celebrations in our Trust and elsewhere in the local community. We have a huge amount to be grateful for in the contribution and sacrifice of a Caribbean origin community locally, and very many Black British colleagues working in our organisation. Donna Mighty and others have led work on the Here to Stay exhibition, which remains in our Education Centre, despite its many tours to venues like the Liverpool Slavery Museum, and its latest launch at Warwick University. We still have work to do – only this week I was asked to sign a complaint explaining – or perhaps explaining away – our inability to offer meals to patients that reflected the diversity of our local community: It is clear we have more to do. So Windrush investments in the Trust were not a one off, and a focus on diversity, in all that we do, including recruitment into our senior leadership, remains a focus for the Board.
I have almost finished this week’s message without mentioning our smokefree start date of Friday 5 July: three weeks away! I am sure you are ready. If you have do have questions or concerns do get in touch with me, with Ruth Wilkin, with David Carruthers or with Paula Gardner. It is hugely encouraging to hear of the dozens of colleagues who have quit smoking on the back of the changes, but we do need to be ready across the board to make the change. A consistent approach with patients and visitors will be essential to the effectiveness of our new arrangements.
I attach this week’s IT stats.
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