Monthly archives: September 2019

Star Awards 2019 – Voting is still open

This year, the Star Awards are set to be the biggest and best yet, recognising those colleagues who go above and beyond the call of duty to help us provide great care and support to our patients.

The ceremony which is due to take place on the 11 October at Villa Park will be the highlight of the staff calendar. There are four awards categories in which the winners are chosen by staff vote.

These categories are:

Employee of the Year:

• Allison Annikey
• Corrine Dacosta
• Huma Naqvi
• Richard Burnell

Clinical Team of the Year (Adults):

• Critical Care and Critical Care Followup
• Homeless Patient Pathway Team
• SPA Single Point of Access

Clinical Team of the Year (Children):

• Children’s Motor Management Clinic
• Domestic Abuse Team
• Paediatric Allergy Team

Non-clinical Team of the Year:

• General Surgical Secretaries
• Medical Education Team
• Patient Access Team

Voting will stay open through to 20 September. Please take the time to think about who has gone the extra mile and submit your votes.

Click here to cast your vote now!

If you have any questions, please contact the communications team on 0121 507 5303 or email swbh.comms@nhs.net.

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Tracy Morrod retirement celebration this Thursday

Tracy Morrod, lead TB clinical nurse specialist will be retiring on from the Trust following a 27 years in nursing within the NHS.

Her retirement celebration will be held in the committee room at Sandwell Hospital on Thursday (19 September) from 12pm – 2pm for anyone wishing to see her and say farewell.

Opening hours extended in Pharmacy during Unity go-live fortnight

The pharmacy department will be extending its opening hours from Friday 21 September for two weeks to help support the roll out of Unity across the Trust.

Note: TTOs and inpatient medication requests can be placed on Unity at any time, but will only be processed and dispensed by pharmacy within our opening hours. Any requests placed on Unity outside of these times will be actioned the next day.

From Saturday 5 October opening times will revert back to weekdays 9am – 5pm and weekends and bank holidays 10am – 3pm.

For more information please contact the pharmacy department on ext. 5259.

Heartbeat: New assessment tool to help clinicians evaluate pain

A pain assessment tool aimed at helping clinicians evaluate patient’s pain to decide upon appropriate treatment and intervention has been rolled out across the Trust and incorporated as part of Unity.

The Abbey Pain Assessment tool is a quick and easy tool which is designed to be used with patients who are having difficulty in communicating for a variety of reasons.

This could include because they have had a stroke, cognitive difficulties, Dementia, distress or even a simple language barrier.

The assessment tool covers six areas which can be used to assess the patient, these are:

• Vocalisation
• Facial expression
• Change in body language
• Behavioural change
• Physiological change
• Physical changes

Using these characteristics the patient is scored to determine the level and type of pain that they are likely to be experiencing.

This method makes it easier to assess pain rather than, for example, asking where on a scale of 1-10 a patient feels their pain is, something which would be difficult to explain when there are communication barriers and also something which is highly subjective.

This scale allows appropriate analgesia to be prescribed and also prompts the clinician to return to the patient after an hour to reassess.

Using the tool means that time is saved for the clinician, who can avoid having to try find ways to communicate in order to gather information, which in turn benefits the patient by limiting any potential frustration.

The Abbey tool is named after Dr Jennifer Abbey who is the developer and innovator behind the Abbey Pain Scale (APS) which has been the standard pain assessment tool used for people who cannot verbalise in Australia and parts of the UK since 2004. Pauline Richards, Project Facilitator in Corporate Nursing Services said: “It makes it much easier for colleagues such as nurses and other clinicians, who can use their own knowledge of the patient to assess them. The tool then acts as a resource to guide them on how to effectively manage that patient’s pain”.

Before the introduction of this tool there wasn’t a standardised template that was being used across the Trust to help with pain management.

Pauline is about to go back and complete her first round of audits to check that the assessment tool is being used correctly and effectively, and that it is embedded within the system.

Pauline said:“ With the use of this assessment tool, it doesn’t matter which ward a nurse is on, or which discipline a doctor is working in, the patient will receive a standardised assessment of their pain.”

Opening hours extended in Pharmacy during Unity

The pharmacy department will be extending its opening hours from Friday 21 September for two weeks to help support the roll out of Unity across the Trust.

Note: TTOs and inpatient medication requests can be placed on Unity at any time, but will only be processed and dispensed by pharmacy within our opening hours. Any requests placed on Unity outside of these times will be actioned the next day.

From Saturday 5 October opening times will revert back to weekdays 9am – 5pm and weekends and bank holidays 10am – 3pm.

For more information please contact the pharmacy department on ext. 5259.

New Square parking maintenance postponed

The multi storey car park at New Square was due to close for maintenance week commencing 23 September until 29 September. However the upgrade work has now been postponed. The revised dates will be released once they have been confirmed. With this in mind, colleagues are advised to continue to park in the New Square multi storey car park where they would normally park unless stated otherwise.

We apologise for any inconvenience this may have caused.

For more information, please contact diane.alford@nhs.net.

Star Awards 2019: Non-Clinical Team of the Year – vote now!

This year, the Star Awards are set to be the biggest and best yet, recognising those colleagues who go above and beyond the call of duty to help us provide great care and support to our patients.

The ceremony which is due to take place on the 11 October at Villa Park will be the highlight of the staff calendar.  There are four awards categories in which the winners are chosen by staff vote including Non-Clinical Team of the Year.

Non-Clinical Team of the Year is a team that has provided consistently excellent performance whilst meeting financial and operational targets.

The nominees this year are:

Non-Clinical Team of the Year:

• General Surgical Secretaries
• Medical Education Team
• Patient Access Team

Voting will stay open until this Friday (20 September). Please take the time to think about who has gone the extra mile and submit your votes.

Click here to cast your vote now!

If you have any questions, please contact the communications team on 0121 507 5303 or email swbh.comms@nhs.net.

Unity devices label and wristband replenishment

In preparation for going live with Unity, the Trust has a stock of Zebra printer labels and wristbands on site, expected to be sufficient to maintain 12 weeks of usage. This level of stock will be maintained after go live, providing a contingency measure should a shortfall need to be immediately resolved.

Prior to going live with Unity, top up stocks will be delivered to all clinical areas that use Unity devices. During the first three weeks of going live with Unity, between 23/09/19 and 11/10/19, should you feel you are running low, please call ext. 5996 or email swbh.mobiledevicemanagement@nhs.net, detailing your location and the volume you require. Please be proactive, providing as much notice as possible. The phone line is operational during Monday to Friday 8am – 5pm.

The standard process from going live with Unity after 11/10/19 will be similar to existing processes for ordering stationery and supplies.

The main clinical wards and departments (detailed in Appendix2) across City Hospital and Sandwell Hospital are centrally managed for supplies meaning ordering is undertaken on their behalf. No action is required from these areas and stock levels will be monitored and managed by Supplies.

For all other areas (any areas not detailed in Appendix2), Zebra printer labels and wristbands can be ordered as follows:

1.  Log onto NHS Supply Chain on-line ordering system using your username and password.
2. Select the ward or department you are ordering for and click ‘confirm’.
3. Click on ‘new order’ at the top of the screen (by the shopping basket).
4. On the ordering page your delivery day is fixed so no need to change this box.
5. The ‘local ref’ box is a free text box to detail any specific requirements.
6. In the ‘NPC’ box type in the ordering code for the item you wish to order and press return. NB. A full list of ordering codes for Unity device consumables will be published before 11/10/19.
7. The full description of the item will appear. Enter the quantity you require in the ‘line qty’ box and press return.
8. On completing your order, click on ‘checkout’. A message may appear advising you that you do not have a budget – click ‘return’ and the message will change to say that your order has gone to your budget holder to be approved.
9. The budget holder will receive an email advising them there is an order to approve.
10. The budget holder approves the order and the order is sent to NHSSC.

NHS supply chain deliveries and areas under material management appendix

Green Impact 2019/20 – get involved

You will have seen the amazing awards that our teams achieved last year, taking part in our sustainability action project across our workplace. This year is going to be bigger and better with Green Impact, with more people excited to take part, and therefore bigger positive changes being made to the Trust as a result.

What is Green Impact?

Green Impact is a United Nations award-winning programme designed to support environmentally and socially sustainable action within organisations. It runs at over 600 different organisations across the world, and our Trust is one of 10 hospitals, 370 GP practices and 30 dentist surgeries taking part to make change happen within the NHS. Work as a team in your department to take actions that will make a big difference for you and the wider Trust, collect points and win awards. Simple!

How do you take part?

We have a bespoke toolkit of actions, just for our Trust. You can find it at www.greenimpact.org.uk/swb. If you are new to the project, simply register with your name and emails, and either a join a team that is already set up or create your own. If you took part last year, log in with the same details to start your 2019 competition. You can then work through as many of the actions as you like between now and the spring, choosing the actions most suited to your department and suggesting new ideas we may not have thought of. There are Bronze, Silver and Gold awards available for every team that takes part, and you can find out how to achieve them within the toolkit itself.

What is new this year?

Last year’s teams gave great feedback. Green Impact have listened, and have made a few tweaks to help more teams take part and help make the journey to your awards more simple. They have made the ‘getting started’ area a bit more streamlined, and have amended some of the Bronze, silver and gold actions too. The scoring is nice and simple – if you achieved a Bronze or Silver award last year, progressing to the next level only requires you to complete the mandatory actions from the previous level. This way the basics are still happening in every team, but you have more time to concentrate on the things that matter to you. You can also use actions you tool last year to add to this year’s toolkit – the ‘help’ section will explain how to do that.

Want help?

For more information on everything sustainability, please contact francesca.silcocks@nhs.net.

Be sure to check out this video featuring Fran Silcocks, Sustainability Officer and other colleagues discussing how the Trust has begun a number of projects to promote a healthier relationship with our environment.

Star Awards 2019: Clinical Team of the Year (Children) – vote now!

This year, the Star Awards are set to be the biggest and best yet, recognising those colleagues who go above and beyond the call of duty to help us provide great care and support to our patients.

The ceremony which is due to take place on the 11 October at Villa Park will be the highlight of the staff calendar.  There are four awards categories in which the winners are chosen by staff vote including Clinical Team of the Year (Children).

Clinical Team of the Year (Children) is a team that has provided consistent, high quality care for children whilst meeting financial and operational targets, a team that has demonstrated best practice or has driven forward improvements in patient care or has pulled together through particularly difficult circumstances. This could include teams who care for children across our Trust settings and services, not just our specialist paediatric teams.

The nominees this year are:

Clinical Team of the Year (Children):

• Children’s Motor Management Clinic
• Domestic Abuse Team
• Paediatric Allergy Team

Voting will stay open until this Friday (20 September). Please take the time to think about who has gone the extra mile and submit your votes.

Click here to cast your vote now!

If you have any questions, please contact the communications team on 0121 507 5303 or email swbh.comms@nhs.net.

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