Monthly archives: March 2020
Heartbeat: Handling headaches – Clinical Nurse Specialist leads the way
A mild ache, thumping headache to debilitating migraine, we have all had them and the impact they have on your life can be anything from slightly irritating to life changing, however the work of a clinical nurse specialist (CNS) is changing the way we manage this common condition.
It’s not often you hear of a clinical nurse specialist who focusses on headaches, however the headache service had been offering headache clinics for the last 15 years and remains the only nurse led diagnostic service in the UK.
A significant proportion of neurology referrals at our Trust are headache related with upwards of 39 per cent of patients presenting with the condition. Likewise, it is the most common neurological problem presented at the emergency department.
The latest review in 2018 by the Work Foundation put the economic cost to the UK of migraine at 6.6 to 8.8 billion pounds per year, with 75 per cent of sufferers unable to work or function during an attack. 86 million working days are lost every year due to this condition and yet remains the most poorly funded of all the neurological conditions.
And if making waves in headache care at our Trust wasn’t enough, Julie has also been involved in providing expert knowledge to the ‘All-Party Parliamentary Group on Primary Headache Disorders’ taking her influence from a local and regional level to the national stage. On 25 March, Julie will be attending the launch of the next phase of the Work Foundation project in The House of Commons to raise awareness of good working practises for employers to support migraine sufferers. This will recommend self-management by patients, but also flexibility by employers to enable people to reduce the disability their migraine causes. Julie says “It is always rewarding and a privilege to attend these meetings, the building is fantastic to see but it also raises awareness of this much maligned condition.” NHS Right Care for England are also looking at developing pathways in which to improve patient care and have recently developed a headache tool kit to help with managing headaches better.
Currently Julie conducts six clinics and sees in the region of 2000 patients per year. In the downtime between clinics, Julie has not only completed Master’s in Chronic Pain Management but also works at UHB in the complex headache clinic one day per week. This has led to joint treatment protocols across the two trusts to ensure continuity of care across the region.
Headache nurses remain a rare commodity, when she started this role there were only 12. The current UK headache nurse group has 60 members, and is growing slowly but surely. Our second headache nurse here at SWBH has just been recruited and should be in post in the next few months. This will increase our capacity to see patients and shorten waiting times for treatments such as botulinum toxin injections for chronic migraine. Headache is such a common problem that staff in any area may be required to assist a patient with a headache, there is plenty of help available to both patients and staff to improve knowledge. There are many resources to choose from.
Heartbeat: Midwives set up sessions for young parents
Sessions for young parents to be and new mums and dads have been set up by a team of midwives.
Our organisation has partnered with Acacia, a charity which offers mental health support to families and Birmingham City Council to deliver the sessions.
New mum Hayley Gordon aged 17, whose baby Alicia is 12 weeks old, welcomed the idea. Speaking at the launch event, she said: “It’s nice to meet other mums and dads and have people to talk to about our babies. They are all the same age so we have things in common and everyone is supportive too. It is also a good way to build up our confidence.”
Hayley was invited to the launch by her midwife, Angela Arnold who first thought of the idea. Angela, who specifically cares for young parents, said:
“I think there’s a need for young parents to have somewhere safe and non-judgemental for them to go whilst pregnant and also after the birth. After talking to young mums, I found that many felt they weren’t confident in going along to their local children’s centres because of their age. That’s when I thought about setting something up that would be beneficial for them.”
The Young Parents Maternity Service already has links with Acacia and Birmingham City Council and, after liaising with them this group for young parents was set up. Speaking about the partnership Angela remarked: “We will cover various subjects like infant feeding, labour, birth and sleep safety. Acacia will provide support around mental health, whilst Birmingham City Council’s young parent advisor will provide information around education, as well as help with benefits. There is also support available with regards to sexual health testing and contraception.”
Katie Mcleod-Peterson, Young Parents Project Group Facilitator, at Acacia added: “We received funding to put into running groups for young parents and we thought this was the perfect project. Having a place to socialise and meet like-minded parents is also important and takes away the risk of social isolation.”
Covid update 7 @SWBHnhs
Dear colleague,
As we enter the weekend, it is very clear that locally the number of unwell people admitted with confirmed or strongly suspected Covid-19 is rising steeply. It is impossible to know if that rise will continue day on day or whether we have a few more days to be ready. In either circumstance this latest update from me outlines the steps that are happening and are imminent to help us to cope. In writing I want to reiterate that discussions about opening beds, or capacity, and moving colleagues into new roles, or staffing, are a language that can seem cold and inhumane. Each person who dies in our care, is looked after by us, or works alongside us, has their own story, needs and fears right now, and nothing in this message is intended to gloss over that. I continue to be daunted and inspired by the work individuals and teams are doing to try and manage.
Hopefully you are increasingly acquainted with the red and blue colour scheme by which we are now trying to clearly indicate areas, be they wards, theatres, lifts and so on, that are largely or wholly Covid-19 positive areas. Blue areas are not the same, but we all recognise that in those areas there remains infection risk, even if it is lower. The scale of red areas will of course reflect admissions. But crucially it will also reflect discharge volume. The next three or four days will see a sustained press here, and elsewhere, to move those patients who can be cared for safely elsewhere to that place. Discharges will determine our ability to remain within our bed base and to see to sustain staffing ratios that we are all more comfortable with. You will appreciate that professional bodies are working on revised risk based staffing levels for all professions and so our modelling of staffing, and beds, reflects both our current practice and emerging guidance for this unique situation.
I am fully aware that alongside our red and blue designations we have posted the current PPE guidance. Our PPE guidance to date has been slightly more than PHE guidance. The PHE guidance is probably about to change, and over the next few days we expect that that guidance, and we, will support surgical mask use in blue areas as well. Supply chain discussions are taking place to ensure that the move to that arrangement is stock supported and making the change will not denude our highest risk colleagues of supply. When (or if) we change our guidance, we will change the posters and confirm the change in our e-bulletin. Presently we are recommended that staff wholly or largely based in the following areas can have access to scrubs: Critical care, theatres level environments, delivery suite, and where you choose in our red areas The 3.5-fold increase in scrub demand is putting real strain on our supply but we are working very hard to catch that up. In truth it will be Monday or Tuesday before we can be confident we have scrub supply to match our recently adapted local guidance. Whilst scrub use may be preferred, it is not a mandated part of our PPE arrangements. For the next few days only choose scrubs if you truly must.
I want to begin here to outline the staffing changes that are happening around you. In doing that, I will provoke questions. But I think it is better you understand the direction of travel, even as the details and personal implications are worked through by local leaders and individual discussions take place this weekend and early next week. Six key points are set out below.
- Critical care capacity will expand into D16 and then into (OPAU) Newton 1. Re-organised medical teams drawn from intensivists and from anaesthetics will run those facilities. Nick Sherwood is best placed to answer questions on that model. Nurse and HCA staffing for those wards has been devised and, recognising a 43 hour week, and allowance for leave and acknowledgement of absence, will mean that we ask around 160 colleagues to join that team. Our first phase are drawn from theatres, but individuals are also going to be asked to move from areas like some of our wards, and speciality roles. Training will take place across eight days from Monday.
- At the same time, and at the same pace, we need to implement revised medical rotas across our assessment and ward areas. At this stage those involved have typically been involved during higher level training, or in recent practice, in such work. A second phase of deployment may be needed drawn from surgical and less acute medical specialties. Whilst training will be provided first on the immediate phase, those outside that should begin to consider how you would equip yourself for a role in this response to surge. Chetan Varma and Sarb Clare are best placed to advise you on the details involved. David Carruthers has already issued guidance on the training and support offer being provided.
- With extra wards open, and some ward nurses and HCAs needed in critical care, we will be asking some staff not currently in ward based practice to move into our wards, either in our community beds or acute. Again a training programme is in place through Helen Cope. We would expect, with the beds we can foresee, and with again a high rate sickness, and some civilised allowance for leave, that at least 100 colleagues in the first instance will be asked to take on these new roles. It is unlikely that those involved have yet been contacted and those discussions will take place in coming days.
- There is a detailed set of options for therapy support to the above model, and a recognition that in other roles such as ward clerks and ward service officers we will need to expand numbers and make some new hires too. That is happening at pace. Remember we are also assisted by having 150 people on a wait list to join us in various roles, especially HCA roles. Frieza Mahmood will be working alongside local managers to coordinate some of these individuals joining us in the next ten days.
- Where colleagues are asked to be moved, we will be matching the higher of your current or equivalent new salary. We will work with personal circumstances around hours, home and life balance, and other reasonable adjustments. You can opt to work different hour patterns, including some shifts, where you have not before. We would be grateful for anyone able to do that, so that we have local flexibility over creating rotas and building teams. Where we are redeploying people from an area that is not ward based to a ward based environment, we will, based on feedback, seek, like Noah’s Ark, to move pairs of colleagues from current teams to new teams. Finally, we are looking to change from Wednesday 1st some of our bank rates and will be paying more, with a specific premium still for those booking five or more shifts. Doing that lets us plan, and that plan lets someone else grab a break.
- The changes outlined above, whilst presented on a rather hospitalist basis, operate on a fully integrated basis. We have colleagues moving into hospital work from community settings, both at FY2 and nursing roles. And we will continue to regard primary care, including the newly opened Hot Covid-19 Centres at Parsonage Street and Aston pride as part of our system and will work to support their care, PPE and staffing.
Clearly this fundamentally different set of clinical services and of roles asked of you is a huge change. By providing training, not just once, but on an going basis, and by providing coaching and counselling, we are looking to mitigate some of the impacts we would all want to avoid. It would be foolish for me to pretend that this is easy or will have no unintended harms. But acting now and gearing up this weekend and next week gives us, and those we serve, the best change of the best response possible.
The scale of adjustment, and our ability to sustain that adjustment over time, will be critically impacted by returns from sick leave or isolation. Further sickness or isolation will be effected by how quickly staff testing can be re-introduced here, and by how many of our now 800 high-end hotel rooms are taken up by you choosing to move away from friends and loved ones for the next phases of this pandemic. I am grateful to colleague from FY1 through senior consultants for you taking up those options, and for the positive feedback received to date.
If you are reading this at home, we will be working with you to get you back to work if you can and we need you here. It will be a week or more before we can usefully use large scale volunteers, medical students, or those from backbone functions moved into clinical areas. But worth mentioning here so that you know you will be called up, and so that those facing clinical work this weekend understand that everyone is going to be in this fight together in the days ahead.
In contrast to some of my other updates the above is rather a lot of information sent your way. I wanted you to read it directly from me on behalf of the executive, and after today’s Board reviews. I want to offer a clear note of thanks to those clinical and managerial leaders working flat out to construct scale-able, humane, and least-bad options in the face of the pandemic. When the plans are communicated here or locally, there will be misunderstandings and difficulties. I urge you to voice your concerns but in doing so to recognise that those creating these plans share your passion for the patients we serve and share your commitment to workforce safety. Mistakes may be made without intent, working together we minimise those chances. Supporting one another we give ourselves the best chance. As always it is kindness that must lie at the heart of our response.
PS … and the fight for staff swabbing goes on.
Every best wish,
Toby
Chief Executive
Sandwell and West Birmingham NHS Trust
Chief Executive’s Message – Friday 27 March
I think it is probably right to devote today’s message to COVID-19 (my final paragraph is not about the pandemic!). We held a webex team talk this week, and my usual video is shortly out. Heartbeat is released next week. There were three other topics in Teamtalk – mandatory training (are you in our 8% of folk who can do it online before Tuesday?), our Safety Plan work, and the launch of our learning GEMS. All good stuff and worth a moment, because there are moments without COVID-19, and it is worth finding ways to not think about it. All of us need to find space. I took some time off earlier in the week, and whatever the huge challenges of the next eight weeks or four months we are trying really hard to insist on some time away on our rosters, and to create some annual leave scope.
Yesterday we changed our site security, or maybe it is our site psychology. In basic terms, with help from our security team and outside contractors, as well as our volunteers, it is no longer possible for most folk not on our staff to enter the sites, either at Leasowes, Rowley Regis, the BTC, City, BMEC or Sandwell. Remember that visiting inpatient relatives is now done by video phone in the main. That approach is all about making sure that staying home is understood in our communities. But it is also a moment when we recognise that everything is changed in our ways of working. A discipline is now needed that divides spaces into hot and cold, COVID-19 and non-Covid, red and blue. That discipline dictates PPE for staff safety. Of course COVID-19 patients have other conditions, and non COVID patients may develop the virus. Nonetheless, now we need, as we are in applying our triage tool in the community, to be thoughtful and careful about the people we are looking after. That same thought and care must dictate how we support those giving frontline care in all our settings, working to get people essentials, safe journeys home, timely discharge, and reassurance even at a distance.
From listening to you, reading your emails, and talking to colleagues, the professionalism and anxiety of this situation is true in equal measure. I am under no delusion that every part of our plans is working perfectly everywhere. Getting PPE at City on Wednesday night when I did some “secret shopping” was not straightforward. Once you ‘know the system’ it works. But I don’t want anyone to go off shift feeling they need to squirrel away masks for tomorrow, nor scrubs. I don’t want teams to be so worried that they deny PPE from their stock to porters, pharmacists, PTS colleagues, or the team next door. On D18, Bryan Knight, and now at Rowley Regis and the Lyng we have stock centres. You won’t get what you want, to be clear, you will get plenty of what the Royal Colleges and PHE say is needed. And if, with the discipline I mentioned, you are in a corridor in FFP3, expect to be challenged – by any of us. This is our stock and we need to use it wisely.
I have to be optimistic that in the week ahead our staff swab pause will be replaced by a local or national programme. I am properly optimistic that the excellence of our critical care teams will see us expand into D16 and OPAU successfully. But these moves into new spaces, or Nightingale field hospitals in this the Year of the Midwife and Nurse, are not just logistical exercises. Our biggest test is how we maintain and sustain humanity and care in the week ahead and the weeks after that. Care at a slight distance. Care amid new circumstances and with new colleagues. Care when one is scared, or certainly apprehensive. None of us want to be spending our waking hours discussing body bag supplies, or thinking about how we expand critical care by 500%, 700% or more. This is a unique situation. We will come through it. But we will be changed by it, as individuals, families, teams, and as an NHS. We need to recognise and accept that, even as we refuse to accept an inevitability to the rising death rates that represent lost years of joy in the people we love.
The next week is our week of training and retraining. Support packages for some medical staff have been issued through David Carruthers. The programme for critical care is agreed, and our thanks to Helen Cope for finalising the ward based teaching. In coming days a lot of colleagues will be asked to move role or base between one clinical service and another. Then towards the end of next week, non-clinical colleagues may be asked to take on some work outside their normal remit later in April. There are a series of waves of change, in essence, where the timing is mildly uncertain but the reality of the pandemic is foretold. Of course those asked to do something different must have support, mentoring, buddies and work/life balance. We are proceeding in the expectation that everyone will find a way to play their part. Yet of course you should raise any concerns or requests for extra help as we move through the changes of coming days.
I recognise that some Trust key workers are worrying about their own or their loved ones’ income. I hope that the announcement made governmentally this week allay some worried. For those being asked to change job remuneration will be protected. For those, like our bank interpreters, whose outpatient work is no longer available we have made an offer to help move some of that expertise into inpatient settings as well as to preserve incomes. You will be aware that construction work on site at the Midland Met and on the GP practice at Sandwell are both halted now. We are working through the construction guidance to see what could be done safely in either case. The Trust does offer support for people struggling with their debts or finances, and you can get that through our SWBH Benefits app and links on Connect. If you are worried about your families’ finances do please make us of that service or wider governmental advice.
In any situation of crisis, even one on this scale, organisations go through phases. We have come now towards the end of the plan phase. Of course the plan will be adapted, but the basic framework of what we need to do and when and how is 80% formed. The absolute leadership task for everyone who manages anyone in our Trust now is the communication phase; talking, listening, clarifying. That is why a number of senior clinicians – Mark Anderson, Nik Makwana, Jawad Khan, Saket Singhal, Nicky Taylor and Julie Thompson – are out and about over coming days making sure that our PPE arrangements are understood and correspond with your lived experience. Start with Red and Blue. Across our sites, today at City and elsewhere this weekend, you will begin to see very clear colour coding for COVID-19 and non-covid areas. Of course which is which and where will change, and frankly in the next week may very well change daily. Likewise some lifts and other facilities are labelled distinguishingly too. That determination to communicate and communicate and communicate has to be a huge part of our response in coming days. It applies to us as peers and to leaders especially. We will have colleagues who have returned from leave, who do not use email or Connect, or who are simply frightened by something they have seen or read. Acknowledging the fear and trauma, as well as the excellence and camaraderie is part of our response now and will be part of what we need to do as an organisation for a long time to come. Daily number announcements, whilst necessary, do not do justice to the individual stories of recovery, of loss, or of distress felt by relatives, colleagues and patients.
Even as I write this message, it is a slight struggle to know how to move onto to other subjects. But to end this week’s post as I began it, there are important things happened outwith and beyond the pandemic. Next week a large number of valued and important colleagues, many of many years standing, move from this Trust to the West Midlands Ambulance Service as patient transport services change organisation. Colleagues will have some new clinical pathways which we will need to adjust to and of course the same employment rights under TUPE. Even if uniforms change, friendships and alliances will not, and now, as ever we depend on the dedication of our PTS teams. On Wednesday, primary care clinicians from Your Health Partnership join our Trust. At a simple level it means that well over 5% of the medical staff of our Trust are now GPs. 10% of local residents have a GP whose service is part of our organisation. Overnight, as it were, nothing changes. But the opportunity to work better together is significant. Learning from the experience of community colleagues who aligned with City and Sandwell over a decade ago, it can sometimes take time to end a sense of “them” and “us”. So because this change is part of our long term 2020 Vision, and because a pandemic demands new responses from us, let’s very quickly be clear that we are both changed by joining with YHP. Loads to learn and outcomes to improve. Consistent with our #welearn programme!
Stay well please. You should be very proud of what you, and we, do.
COVID-19 bulletin: Friday 27 March
The Trust is now publishing a daily bulletin. This will take all guidance and information and tell you which changes we are implementing when and how. Please use this bulletin and daily cascade arrangements within clinical groups to guide local action. Remember KINDNESS is our watchword in implementing these changes.
1. Red and blue areas, PPE availability and guidance
Across our sites it should now be clear which areas are red, with some Covid-19 positive patients cared for within, and those that are blue, with lower risk of Covid patients within. Which wards are red will continue to grow at pace. The same model is used across critical care and we are opening a further ICU ward on D16 which will give us more ‘red’ capacity.
All sites now have our 25th March PPE guidance, which go further than PHE guidance in a few respects. Further, revised guidance from PHE is expected and when that arrives we will review that and match it to supply orders we are allowed to make. It is really important that PPE is used in line with our current guidance as that is the basis on which we are permitted stock.
2. Testing of staff and use of hotels
The Trust suspended our staff testing programme earlier this week. Clearly national discussions continue to try and get staff testing in place. Our expectation remains that it will be the end of next week before a local programme is put in place. We would be thrilled if something is brought on line sooner and are ourselves exploring every commercial idea.
Meanwhile, it is really important that staff needed to care for patients in our sites take up the offer of hotel accommodation through the Trust. Feedback from clinical colleagues at all levels of seniority is really positive about the options available, and the pace of moves. This weekend please consider within your household whether this something you need to try. For more information and to reserve your room please email swbh.hotel-booking@nhs.net
3. Use of video technology in clinical practice
Over the last week we have implemented two key changes to our normal practices of care. Firstly, visiting for inpatients has moved to a phone or video enabled consultation. It is really important, as #stayhome becomes the norm across our country that we get used to promoting this approach with our inpatients. Meanwhile, we have moved most outpatient consultations onto a remote only basis. This will continue only until our staffing plan requires those same clinicians to transfer to wholly inpatient practice. Nonetheless, the technology is used now and may be used “after” Covid-19, so it is worth engaging with it.
Click here for details of drop in sessions on the technology with virtual sessions planned for next week.
Over the next few days we will also pilot both technology and simulation arrangements to support consultation with inpatients from your home or self-isolating settings. This is likely to be something that we need to utilise as staffing numbers become more challenging in a fortnight’s time.
4. Taking care to stay well
This is an intensely challenging time to work in any role in our Trust. We have a range of wellbeing support in place for individuals and teams. That includes psychological support, recognising the immediate, and potentially long term effects, of working in unfamiliar environments, or of working more difficult shifts patterns, or of working with higher rates of harm, including elevated mortality. Deaths in our care will rise above what has been true before, and deaths will occur in the care of teams where ordinarily that would be a very, very rare event. It is important that being stoic does not do harm, and so we would encourage everyone to consider the support on offer.
Please see link below to access our dedicated COVID-19 health and wellbeing page which offers multiple resources and advice.
You can also access our COVID-19 health and wellbeing area through our myConnect app in the “Health and Wellbeing” tab. myConnect is compatible with both iPhones and Android handsets, and is available to download from the Apple Appstore as well as the Google Playstore, simply search for ‘SWBH MyConnect’.
5. Getting into work and parking with us
For some days now our parking barriers have been raised, and from Wednesday April 1st parking formally becomes free for the duration of the Covid-19 period. Please do take advantage of this, but remember to park only in designated bays. Fines and tickets will be enforced for parking which breaches those rules in the interests of our collective wellbeing.
Bus and rail services are changing. And Trust travel arrangements must respect social distancing. Please look on myConnect or on Network West Midlands for details of services. If you expect to be late for work, please contact your manager the day before to discuss how we can work flexibly. We are relying, and your colleagues are too, on all of us making it in.
Do you know how to make a WhatsApp Phone/Video call?
As many colleagues across the Trust will not be able to attend meetings due to the COVID-19 pandemic it is essential to be able to video call each other. With this mind, we have put together a simple guide in how to make a a WhatsApp Phone/Video call.
For more information please contact y.klair@nhs.net.
Instructions for installing a desktop PC at home during COVID-19
If you need to install your desktop PC to work from home please see below document for detailed instructions.
Instructions for Installing a Desktop PC at Home
For further information please call ext. 4050.
COVID-19 bulletin: Thursday 26 March
The Trust is now publishing a daily bulletin. This will take all guidance and information and tell you which changes we are implementing when and how. Please use this bulletin and daily cascade arrangements within clinical groups to guide local action. Remember KINDNESS is our watchword in implementing these changes.
- We have now closed our sites to people other than employees and patients
As we indicated on Tuesday, from this morning all of our sites are closing to visitors. That includes the BTC, BMEC, Rowley Regis and our acute sites, as well as Leasowes. This makes it very important you carry staff ID and expect to be respectfully challenged. The purpose of this close-down is to help us to prevent infection spread but also to create an environment where we can concentrate our efforts on the current pandemic and on supporting staff in this situation. Sometimes, because of our estate, the only place for colleagues to step away from the clinical environment is to step into public areas and we want a degree more privacy in this difficult time.
Patient visiting was changed on March 14th. That remains, although other places are now adopting the same strategy. Visiting is via telephone and video phone, and each ward has a supply. Please ensure your colleagues know how to use this and actively draw it to the attention of our patients. Now is a frightening time for many and it must be right that we work to support them seeing or talking to relatives. There are a very small number of visitor exceptions, which our security arrangements will be aware of and support. They may need to contact a ward on that basis, and will benefit from your assistance.
To be clear the intention is not to make the site appear intimidating or militarised, but it is intended to support the very disciplined effort now needed to manage the weeks ahead.
2. Our wards are now designated as query covid (red) and non-covid (blue)
This is a change based on both staff feedback and the evolving pandemic situation. Clearly, even in a non-covid area it is possible a patient may develop symptoms. Likewise not everyone in a query covid area has received a test outcome, and some who do have such outcomes may later prove positive.
Notwithstanding all of that, to aid understanding, PPE clarity, and simplicity for staff working shifts in a changing situation, this is now, and will remain our approach. Please look for these colour designations in other areas of our sites too, such as theatres.
3. Hotel accommodation – there’s still room(s)
We have been messaging for a few days the option, and the need, to take up hotel accommodation. We would urge colleagues to consider now this option, which all of the NHS is working through. Leaving loved ones and established households is not easy, but as travel gets tougher, shift patterns change, and it becomes ever more vital to be ready for an evolving patient care emergency, please look to make this choice in the next 72 hours.
To book a room you can email swbh.hotel-booking@nhs.net
If your request is out of hours, you will get an out of office email with instructions of the number to call in order to book your room.
4. Critical care changes
As you know the next phase of the pandemic sees critical care occupancy and use grow hugely. Training is going on now to support the first wave of extra staff to move into our critical care teams. Query Covid patients are in both units presently, and D16 at City will open soon as a red Unit too. OPAU at Sandwell will, in time, open as a blue unit.
You will be aware of the London Excel Field Hospital. Plans locally are not finalised nor imminent, but it gives you a sense of the scale of what is ahead. If you have critical care skills, or expect to be asked to help and want to be given training now (and you will have training before you start) please contact Rebecca O’Dwyer and the team. We cannot say we have not had warnings of what is to come and now we need to finalise our preparations. The skills and quality of our team is such that we have been asked to coordinate this effort across our STP. Even so this will be a significant psychological and logistical challenge, to kindly look after many more people in very grave situations.
5. PPE and scrub distribution
Intensive work is going on across our sites to make sure that we have a clear and smooth 24/7 access arrangement for both PPE and scrubs where relevant. Visuals and paper briefings will be distributed tomorrow to absolutely make clear how this works. Senior staff are out and about talking to and listening to you to make sure that the arrangements are understood and work in practice not just in theory. Do get in touch with any of the senior team with queries, and look out for Drs Mark Anderson, Nick Makwana, Jawad Khan and Sakeet Singhal, as well as Nicola Taylor, Julie Thompson and Toby Lewis who are roving across sites in the next four days to make sure that we hear your concerns and help clarify any glitches or misconceptions.
Health and wellbeing around COVID-19
Feeling stressed, overwhelmed, fearful or anxious at the moment is a completely normal response to the situation for all of us. Managing your stress and psychological health at this time is as important as your physical health. Taking care of your basic needs and employing helpful coping strategies are top priorities.
Connect has a new page dedicated to Health and Wellbeing during COVID-19. Keep a look out for all the latest news and advice to keep you well.
New volunteer role started at the Trust today
Our site may have gone in lockdown today, however we have also launched a new role within our volunteer service, Response Volunteer.
The role of a Response Volunteer is to assist the Trust during the COVID-19 Pandemic. They will be flexible and able to take on tasks that will support our frontline colleagues, whilst they care for our patients.
Note: All duties will be carried out under the supervision/guidance of the volunteer service/Your Trust Charity and will never include tasks of a clinical nature.
If you see one of our volunteers across our sites be sure to say hello!
If you’re interested in volunteering or would like to find out more about the service, please call 0121 507 4855 or email swbh.volunteer@nhs.net.
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