Sunday 5 July was the 72^nd birthday of the NHS and this year felt extremely significant, certainly one of the most in my nursing career and one that I am sure will stand out for us all. On Saturday we commemorated the one minute silence for colleagues lost to Covid-19, with wards lighting LED candles; I am sure many of you joined us and placed candles and lamps in your windows. We are very grateful to our local authorities for lighting up their buildings in blue, and their thank you videos on social media.

I also hope you were able take the opportunity to join in the clap for carers. And of course no birthday would be complete without cake! Alongside cupcakes for staff, more bumblebee badges were ordered (these were given to our nurses on International Day of the Nurse) so that everyone has a bee to mark their contributions to the NHS during the pandemic. The bee was chosen as our patients are placing bee stickers on our Trees of Life to mark their recovery from Covid.

It has been a challenging few months for us all, and continues to be so, and I would like to thank each and every one of you for your support and appreciation of our staff – it has touched us all immensely.  

And moving from one important date to another, our Annual General Meeting will take place on 30 September. We’ll be hosting it virtually and hope you will be able to join us. More details will be shared nearer the time.

However much closer in the diary, I am very pleased that from today (7 July) we are able to offer a robust, seven day a week mechanical thrombectomy service for patients across our boroughs and into Essex. Previously we were only able to offer a sporadic service, however successfully recruiting additional staff has meant we have been able to improve this.

A mechanical thrombectomy is a procedure used to treat acute stroke patients by removing blood clots from the brain, and leads to much better outcomes including greater independence and mobility. Incredibly some patients have walked out of hospital after just 24 hours, a phenomenal feat considering stroke is the biggest cause of disability and the 4th largest cause of death in the UK. 

The thrombectomies will take place at Queen’s Hospital where we have our Hyper Acute Stroke Unit. I’m very proud of the teams for their tremendous hard work which will make a real difference to the lives of our patients and their families.

It is extremely important that if people are suffering from a suspected stroke or other potentially life-threatening condition, that they do come in to our hospitals for treatment. Please rest assured we are taking every precaution to keep patients, visitors and staff safe in line with national infection control guidance.

Infection control guidance will continue to dictate how and where we deliver services, and as we have mentioned previously, this will mean some services will be delivered from different locations than prior to the pandemic.

We are working hard to reduce waiting lists and are prioritising patients in order of clinical urgency, identifying those who need to be seen within two weeks, four weeks and three months. Waiting lists are a national concern and across north east London we are looking at our total capacity as a system, with a view that together we can manage our resources more efficiently.

Endoscopy is also an area that is of great national focus. Capacity has been significantly reduced due to infection control guidance, and waiting lists have grown as only emergency patients were able to be seen during the pandemic. We, like others across the country, and together across north east London, are working hard to plan how we can start to increase this capacity whilst continuing to keep patients safe. We will keep you updated as our plans progress.

While services were suspended or limited, it gave us an opportunity to retrain and redeploy staff, particularly into Critical Care. You may have seen on BBC London some weeks ago, a feature on our innovative multi-disciplinary critical care training programme. Kenye Karemo, Director of Workforce Development, Policy and Strategy, was responsible for designing the training and has written a feature on the experiences of some of our redeployed staff  who talk about how they ‘were proud to be there’. You can read the story on our website.

You will find on our website a feature with Consultant Midwife for Midwife-led Care Rosemary Idiaghe. Rosemary discusses the role of cultural awareness in great patient care and the contribution staff from different cultures make to our hospitals. This is particularly poignant at this time, with the Black Lives Matter movement, and the disparities in the risks and outcomes of Covid-19 on BAME people, highlighting inequalities which the NHS must address.

There is a national focus on the completion of risk assessments for our BAME and vulnerable staff and a deadline set of 23 July; data will be published shortly by all NHS organisations. We have been working hard with colleagues to ensure assessments are carried out and plans put in place to keep these staff safe, comfortable and supported, because that is absolutely the right thing to do.

Tony is back from annual leave next week and while he’s been away I have been delighted to have the opportunity to share our latest updates with you.

Do stay safe and look after yourselves and your families.

Best wishes,

Kathryn Halford OBE 
Chief Nurse and Deputy Chief Executive