Monthly archives: November 2022

Heartbeat: Trust welcomes local councillors to Midland Met

SWB welcomed two local councillors – Cllr Farut Shaeen and Cllr Zahir Hussain who represent the Soho and Victoria ward. This was a significant visit as it provided an opportunity to engage with leaders that represent members of our local community.

Our patients, carers, communities, and members of local organisations are hugely important as we work to shape the future of our services as we get ready to open Midland Met in 2024. Whether it’s an opportunity to provide feedback, ask questions or attend events, we are working collaboratively to ensure that we provide outstanding care across all our services.

Currently, to support this, we have an array of public and community engagement events taking place across Sandwell and West Birmingham. Plus, we are actively reaching out to community groups, and leaders sharing updates about the many projects taking place, including our Fundamentals of Care framework, and promoting ways people can get involved, such as via our first ever Young People’s Forum.

Richard Beeken, CEO, hosted the visit with the support of Jayne Salter Scott, Head of Public and Community Engagement and expert tour guides, Dawn Webster and Jackie Cooper, Senior Commissioning Managers.

Before heading off on the tour, Richard took the opportunity to share some of the highlights of our new hospital, explaining that we are expanding our organisation and restructuring our services by making Midland Met into our acute centre for care. Richard also discussed our communitybased services giving a comprehensive update to help the councillors understand our future service model and how everything fits together.

Cllr Hussain remarked: “It’s positive to hear that SWB is expanding from two to three sites as some people in the community believe it to be the opposite. It was also interesting to hear directly from the Trust about how you are transforming services to offer a clinical model designed to keep patients active and that incorporates dedicated teams led by acute care consultants.

“The Winter Garden is a large area with great views from the balcony. It’s still under construction, but you can see that it will be a stunning space when it’s finished.”

Cllr Shaeen remarked: “It has been beneficial to see Midland Met for ourselves. The hospital is an impressive site that is much larger than we anticipated it to be.

“It was helpful to hear about the plans for the hospital now and to get an insight into the longer-term plans to help benefit our communities. Midland Met will be a good asset for the people that live here, and I was particularly interested in the plans to help create jobs. The learning campus will be a welcome addition and will help local people thrive and develop fulfilling careers.”

Jayne Salter-Scott, Head of Public and Community Engagement, said: “Hosting visits like this is an essential part of our strategy to engage with our residents and those who represent them. Face-to-face meetings are one of the most effective ways to have meaningful conversations and it helps us to look at how we can work together to achieve our shared goals.

“I would like to thank the councillors for their time and look forward to welcoming them back soon for another visit where we’ll be able to show them further progress.”

Heartbeat: Trust launches brand new TikTok channel

The communications team recently launched the brand-new Trust TikTok channel @SWBHNHS, to promote educational content to the younger generation.

Anuji Evans, External Communications Manager said: “I’m really excited to have launched SWB’s new TikTok channel, which gives us the opportunity to create content in a unique way that hasn’t been done by the Trust before.

“I encourage all teams to get involved in making this a success – if you think you’ve got an interesting idea that could work for a TikTok video, please get in touch with comms and we can help bring your idea to life.

“I also urge all to support us by following our account and sharing our content wherever you can.”

As a part of the educational push, the team will be creating a ‘Myths vs Facts’ series to debunk common health myths and inform people on the facts.

The first video of the series was created in collaboration with Anne Rutland, Specialist Skin Cancer Nurse, to target skin cancer awareness. Anne told Heartbeat: “It’s so important that as a Trust, we try to target a variety of demographics when relaying important health information.

“There are many common misconceptions surrounding all things sun and skin. I provided the comms team with some fact and fiction statements about skin cancer and sun damage, which they then converted into a piece of content that made it engaging and easy to understand.

“The videos being created are a great use of social media to get the information out there in a way that is accessible and fun. I would highly recommend other teams to start thinking about TikTok and how they can educate others through the platform.”

The communications team have a lot of exciting videos in the pipeline, working with various teams and departments across the Trust.

A range of videos have already been posted, including a car parking guide, one celebrating Prosthetists and Orthotists Day at Sandwell and behind-the-scenes footage of MMUH.

Head over to the channel by clicking here.

If you or your team think you could be the next SWB TikTok stars, contact the communications team on 0121 507 5303 or via email at swbh.comms@nhs.net.