Temporary changes in our paediatric ED at King George Hospital

As I shared with you in last week’s update, temporary changes will come into force in our paediatric Emergency Department (ED) at King George Hospital (KGH) next Monday (16 November).

Please do read our statement on our website for further details, and I would be grateful if you could share this information across your networks so as many people as possible are aware of this change before it comes into effect next week.

This closure is a temporary measure, because of Covid-19. We are absolutely committed to reopening the paediatric Emergency Department at King George Hospital during the night as soon as it is safe to do so. We want to do this by April 2021, subject to the ongoing impact of the pandemic. We will continue to monitor the situation on a daily basis. 

Welcoming partners back to 20-week maternity scans

We are pleased that we’ve been able to allow pregnant women to bring their partners along to their 20-week scans again.

As you’ll know, women have been attending alone throughout the pandemic to help keep everyone safe and allow social distancing.

We’re delighted that after careful consideration we can have partners accompany our women for their 20-week scans. Unfortunately we cannot yet offer this for 12-week scans. This is because we care for lots of women and have very limited space in our hospitals, particularly in our waiting rooms. We must also ensure we are abiding by stringent infection prevention and control measures.

We’ll keep this under review and continue to look for ways to further support women and their partners.

More information about our Maternity services during Covid-19 can be found on our website.

New ED entrance at Queen’s Hospital

As we continue to make changes to our hospitals to keep everyone safe as we deal with the ongoing pandemic, we’ve moved our Emergency Department entrance at Queen’s Hospital.

ED patients now enter through the main atrium, where we have introduced a split queueing system; keeping ED patients separate from outpatients and visitors from the moment they arrive.

Outpatients and visitors continue to go through our thermal scanners, while urgent and emergency care patients have a dedicated route on the opposite side and go into new streaming pods, where they are directed to get the care they need.

This change has helped to improve flow through our Urgent Treatment Centre and ED.

We’ve introduced signage to ensure it’s clear where the new entrance is located, and we’ve also moved the drop-off point, it’s now located between the multi-storey car park and front of the hospital.

Occupational Therapy Week

We marked the national Occupational Therapy (OT) Week (2 to 8 November) and it was a great opportunity to recognise the diverse range of OTs working across our Trust.

One of our senior OTs, Elyscia Howell, told us about her experience working on the frontline supporting Covid-19 patients. It was a challenging time for Elyscia, who worked at our Trust straight after qualifying, and had only re-joined us in April.

She said: “It was a really tough finding my feet in a pandemic. I started off on our Covid wards, piloting ways of treating Covid patients, most of whom were very unwell. It was a lot of work and we were right in the thick of it. We were looking at really basic things, like how we could help patients to go to the toilet and wash themselves.

“What made a difference for me was how our teams pulled together, there was a great family spirit; everyone was checking in and picking each other up when we were having a tough time. That made it much more bearable.”

Read more about Occupational Therapy week on our website.

MBE for our chaplain

I previously shared with you that Michele Elliot, our divisional director of nursing for emergency care and anaesthetics, received an MBE in the delayed Birthday Honours for her work during the Covid-19 pandemic.  Well, I’m delighted to add that Parminder Kaur Kondral, who supports our patients as a volunteer honorary chaplain, was also awarded an MBE.

Parminder is the National Coordinator of the UK Sikh Healthcare Chaplaincy Group. Her MBE recognises her services to the Sikh community.

She said: “The work I do with hospitals, hospices and healthcare centres across the UK means I am able to support people sometimes in very difficult situations. It is my honour to be able to do this.” Read more.

Chief Operating Officer Shelagh speaks out in support of mental health

The Covid-19 pandemic has been challenging for everyone, so we are taking the mental health of our staff extremely seriously.

As part of awareness raising Rev Philip Wright, our Lead Chaplain, spoke to Chief Operating Officer Shelagh Smith. She shared her experiences, both personally and professionally, of being a leader in our Trust dealing with a global pandemic, and the effects it had on her mental wellbeing.

You can watch the video of their chat on our website. It’s a thought-provoking watch and I would encourage everyone to take the time to see it.

Thinking ‘HomeFirst’ for our patients

We’ve launched the second phase of our HomeFirst discharge pathway, working with our partners to think ‘home first’ when planning for our patients.

HomeFirst is when an assessment for a patient’s rehab care and equipment needs takes place in their own home – giving a more accurate picture of the level of support they actually require, and ensures long-term decisions about their future are not made while they’re in hospital.

We ran a successful trial of the scheme last November and this second phase includes involvement from all three of our boroughs, whereas previously we only focused on Havering. Read more about HomeFirst on our website.

Another Rising Star at our Trust

During Black History Month, I shared nurse Angela Simiyu’s story with you. Angela had been named one of the Rising Stars by the Royal College of Nursing. Our second nurse to receive this honour was Lola Smith.

Lola is a practice development nurse in our Children’s Emergency Department. She said: “Getting recognition so publicly for a job that I love and would do regardless has really blessed me. I was genuinely shocked when I found out and the outpouring of love from my team and the Trust has been phenomenal.”

We’re lucky that Lola found her true calling as a nurse, she’s also been a children’s minister at church and was a primary school teacher.

More accolades for our teams

It’s great to have so much good news from our own people to share with you in this update, so I end on a positive note.

Temitope Babajide, a third-year adult nursing student, has won the Nursing Student Award 2020 at the Royal College of Nursing’s annual awards. Temitope was recognised following a placement in Ghana. By working with local healthcare providers, she established a community clinic offering healthcare screening and social events for an isolated group. You can read the RCN article featuring her story on their website.   

And huge congratulations were in order for Taz Ebenezer, Ramandeep Kaur, Marie Loizides, and Jacqui Harrison, who all gained a place on the Digital Health London Fellowship Programme, a learning community focused on accelerating the pace of digital transformation within the NHS. Find the full list of this year’s fellows and their profiles on the website.

Lastly, to keep everyone as up-to-date as possible, we are now publishing Covid-19 related data on our website every Thursday. As I’m sure you’ll appreciate, this information is based on a snapshot in time, taken every Wednesday.

Tony Chambers
Chief Executive