Flu season fast approaching

Andrew McMenemy’s blog

Flu Vaccination

The start of the influenza season is fast approaching and we will be launching the Trust campaign to vaccinate staff on 1st October 2019. The first day of the campaign will be marked with our launch event taking place in the Health Hub at the main entrance. This will be followed by a number of events throughout the period of the campaign. The success in recent years has been down to having excellent collaboration and involvement with peer vaccinators across all departments.

We are still looking for peer vaccinators to cover every department in the Trust. As a peer vaccinator you will be provided with all the materials needed to run a successful campaign in your area. If staff in your area, or you yourself, are interested in becoming a peer vaccinator they can contact Frankii Tibbetts, HR project co-ordinator at Francesca.tibbetts@nhs.net .

Peer vaccinators are only required to vaccinate in their area but have the opportunity to offer to vaccinate any passing staff who want the jab!

Essential face-to-face training is available from 16th-30th September, Monday to Friday at 3pm, 3.5pm, 4.30pm or 4.15pm in the staff health & wellbeing eepartment, to book please call ext. 2958.

Staff Survey

We are pleased to announce that the 2019 Staff Survey will be launched on 8th October 2019.

Over the last 12 months, we have been working hard on making changes as a result of the feedback we received in last year’s staff survey. The main focus was around behaviours, including feedback relating to bullying and harassment. This led to the recent launch of the Behaviour Framework which outlines acceptable and unacceptable behaviours. We have also reviewed the way you report bullying and harassment issues and are working to make this process more accessible, informative and effective.

Other improvements have included: launching the three R’s (Rest, Rehydrate and Refuel), the community break campaign, going smoke free, opening a secure bike shelter for staff, extending the gym opening hours, introducing yoga classes, free health checks and the launch of the manager essential training in September 2019.

There is much more work to be done, however it is only made possible with your feedback!

It’s great that so many NHS staff take part in this survey. It only takes a few minutes and your feedback is very important.

Responses to this survey are strictly confidential. No one from where you work will see your completed survey or be able to identify individual responses. The survey is being run by Picker on behalf of our organisation.

Dudley People Plan

The Dudley People continues to be launched throughout the Trust and I and my team will be going to department meetings to discuss the plan alongside the new Behavioural Framework. Please follow the link to see and share both the People Plan and the Behavioural framework.

If you and your team would like to discuss the plan or framework further then please contact my PA Laura Round at laura.round1@nhs.net and she will arrange for me or my team to meet your team. 

Patient Safety Week

The World Health Organisation is holding the very first World Patient Safety Day on 17th September 2019 to raise awareness of patient safety and urge people to show their commitment to making healthcare safer. We are supporting the campaign with a whole week of activities and we want everyone to get involved.

We will be lighting up Russells Hall Hospital orange as a really visual way to raise awareness. We will be asking patients what patient safety means to them and launching our new system for capturing positive learning.

Staff are encouraged to come along to the GREATix launch at the Grand Round on Thursday 19th September 2019 at 12.30pm. We are asking staff to create patient safety awareness displays in their area which will be judged by patient safety lead Dr Nicky Calthorpe, chief nurse Mary Sexton and medical director Julian Hobbs.

It’s important that we have an open and transparent culture where we encourage blame free reporting and learning from errors. After all, keeping patients safe is paramount to everything we do

Mike Wood MP Visit

Dudley South MP Mike Wood is supporting our campaign to raise awareness of sepsis symptoms and prevention. He is joining the sepsis team at the Health Hub at Russells Hall Hospital tomorrow 13th September which is World Sepsis Day. Everyone is welcome at the Health Hub – they will be there until 4pm.  Mike is also volunteering at the hospital next Tuesday, 17th September.