January 2015
Welcome
Welcome to the January issue of Inside
St John’s.
Pensions
New pension arrangements are to be
introduced for public sector pension
schemes from April 2015. Information on
the changes can be found here.
Smoke-Free Lothian
Following the Scottish Government’s
publication in 2013 of The National
Tobacco Control Strategy, which states
“All NHS Boards will implement and
enforce smoke-free grounds by March
2015,” Lothian Partnership Forum
recently agreed a NHS Lothian SmokeFree Policy which will be implemented
from 31 March 2015.
SJH have established a smoke-free
policy group who meet fortnightly to take
forward the arrangements for the site.
New inpatient antibiotic
guidelines
The antibiotic guidelines for the treatment
of common conditions in hospital are
changing – if you prescribe or administer
antibiotics you need to know about this.
For further information, please visit the
intranet.
Marking our 25th
Anniversary
In addition to the official opening of the
MRI, that was opened by Tam Dalyell
and Brian Houston on 26 January, a
couple of other events are planned to
mark this event. Work is underway in
collaboration with Artlink to develop a
historic presentation of the development
of the hospital which can be displayed
near the entrance of the hospital. This
will draw on archive material but if any
member of staff has interesting
photographs or material they think might
be of interest, please share this with
Agnes McKenna in the Volunteers office.
Additionally a couple of events are being
scheduled for early June which will allow
staff to participate in events to mark this
milestone. Further details will be available
shortly.
PVG Retrospective Checking
The Protection of Vulnerable Groups
(PVG) legislation replaced the disclosure
arrangements for people who work with
vulnerable groups. It helps to ensure that
people who have a known history of
harmful or abusive behaviour are unable
to work with children and protected
adults.
After October 2015 it will be illegal for
anyone who is involved in regulated work
not to be on the PVG Scheme.
NHS Lothian needs to have everyone in
regulated work on the Scheme by July
2015. If you have not already completed
a PVG form and think you qualify, contact
your line manager in the first instance to
discuss further, or go to HROnline for
more information. If you have any
questions about the PVG retrospective
exercise, please e-mail the team:
pvgretrospective@nhslothian.scot.nhs.uk
Development of front door
area
A project plan is being developed to
improve the layout of the reception at the
front entrance of St John’s. The changes
will involve making the Patient
Information Centre much more prominent
and visible, to support its use. This will
also allow any market stall activity to be
more appropriately placed within a
dedicated area currently occupied by the
existing Patient Information Centre. This
will help reduce congestion in what is a
busy area and help to improve how the
main entrance operates for patients,
visitors and staff. We are also looking to
increase the role of volunteers to help
support reception staff in directing visitors
around the hospital.
Critical Care decant
The decant of the Critical Care Unit on
Monday 12 January was very successful
and all the team involved are to be
congratulated. The unit will be based in
ward 20 for three or four months whilst
the full refurbishment continues. The
longer term future for the use of Ward 20
is part of the overall site masterplanning
work and a business case is being
developed to utilise the area for additional
surgical capacity for ophthalmology and
plastics. This proposal has still to be
submitted and forms part of a wider plan
to develop more in-house capacity for
elective work through the master planning
process.
EHLF Small Grants Process
Small Grants (up to £5k)
Small Grants are only available to
projects that will directly benefit patients
of NHS Lothian, whether in hospital
wards and departments, or in community
health services. Applicants must be
employees of NHS Lothian or those
employed by GP practices contracted to
NHS Lothian and, if required, will have
informed the applicable manager of their
application before submission. In
exceptional circumstances, grants of up
to £5k may be available.
If applying from a GP practice contracted
to provide NHS Lothian services, please
select ‘General Medical Services’ as your
legal status when completing the online
application form.
Application Deadlines
Small Grants are awarded four times a
year; the next deadline for applications is
26 February 2015. Further information
can be found here.
Ebola
A significant amount of work and training
has been undertaken to prepare all
potential sites for dealing with any patient
with suspected Ebola.
The Emergency Department team has
established plans to care for any patients
who present to the department. NHS
Lothian has also established the
laboratory at the Royal Infirmary of
Edinburgh as the centre for NHS
Scotland where blood samples can be
tested for the virus. This will speed up
the diagnosis process to help keep
patients, staff and the public safe.
More details can be found on the staff
intranet.
WELPACT 3
Stroke Service
The next West Lothian Pathways
Collaborative (WELPACT) event takes
place on Tuesday 10 February 2015 at
the Howden Centre.
SJH provides a comprehensive stroke
service covering all aspects of stroke,
from acute care including thrombolysis,
inpatient rehabilitation, community
rehabilitation and urgent Stroke and TIA
(Transient Ischaemic Attack) outpatient
clinics with same day access to carotid
doppler ultrasound.
The WELPACT programme aims to focus
on improving care for patients with longterm conditions, as well as looking at a
range of actions we can take to reduce
the risk of patients being readmitted to
hospital by working differently with
hospital, community, social care and
voluntary care services.
Dr Andy Longmate – originally a
consultant anaesthetist - has extensive
experience in patient safety and
improvement methodology at clinical and
Government levels and we are delighted
to welcome Andy as our keynote
speaker.
We will also run an interactive morning, to
hear about and shape new initiatives
which improve the patient experience and
our ability to care. In the afternoon we are
going to see what we can do to improve
the care of frail elderly people in West
Lothian.
More details can be found on the staff
intranet. Please reserve your place by emailing laura.mancini@luht.scot.nhs.uk
Staff changing rooms
upgrade
The flooring in the second phase of the
staff changing area has been completed
and the work on the toilet and shower
areas will be completed by the end of
January. This will allow Domestic
Services to clean the area before
informing staff that they can move back to
their original lockers. Phase three work
should start on 16 February. Thanks to
staff for their co-operation with ongoing
work.
To improve stroke services in
NHSScotland the Scottish Government
has agreed a set of stroke standards and
targets which every stroke service has to
achieve.
Locally we have been consistently
meeting the CT scanning target and the
Aspirin target has been around 90 per
cent but improvements can be made to
the Stroke Unit admission standard and
the swallow screening standard.
Staff who are involved in the care of
stroke patients particularly in the acute
assessment phase are encouraged to be
aware of these standards and targets to
help us achieve them consistently.
Referrals should be emailed to
(stroke_unit@nhslothian.scot.nhs.uk)
A phone call to the ward (ext 54104) to
alert us to individuals with definite strokes
is also helpful in terms of planning
transfers.
Dementia Awareness
Courses
There is a two hour session and a full
study day on dementia available to book
which aims to support staff working with
vulnerable adults.
Further information on both sessions and
details of how to book can be found on
the staff intranet.
Mediation Service
Staff flu
NHS Lothian is launching a mediation
service, which will provide impartial,
confidential advice, to help resolve
disputes amongst employees.
Staff still have time to get a free,
seasonal flu jab. The flu season is the
worst the southern hemisphere has seen
for six years and may be an indication of
what will happen in the northern
hemisphere.
The mediation service aims to ‘help you
resolve your conflicts quickly and locally.’
This service will launch on 2 February.
For more information and to access this
service, please contact the Mediation
Coordinator at:
mediation@nhslothian.scot.nhs.uk
Staff Travel
A number of changes have been made to
the MPV/Shuttle bus service between
sites. Please visit the intranet for further
information.
Celebrating Success Awards
– Change of date
The Celebrating Success Awards will
now be held in June with nominations
opening on 13 February 2015.
This decision was taken as the October
date coincided with various other national
health awards. An earlier date will allow
staff to re-enter their nominations for the
likes of the Scottish Health Awards later
in the year. Further information can be
found on the intranet.
MoonWalk Scotland 2015
The 10th annual MoonWalk Scotland is
now open for entries. The event, which
will be held at Inverleith Park, Edinburgh
on Saturday 13 June, raises awareness
and vital funds for breast cancer. One of
the most notable successes from the
funds is the new mammography unit at
the Western General Hospital. You can
sign up now by clicking here.
Getting vaccinated is the best way to
protect patients, the community, yourself
and your family from this potentially
serious, preventable disease. Further
information can be found here.
NHSScotland Event 2015:
call for poster abstracts now
open
Leading Integration for Quality is the
theme of this year’s NHS Scotland Event,
taking place on 23-24 June at the
Scottish Exhibition and Conference
Centre, Glasgow. A key feature is the
poster exhibition, which forms an integral
part of best practice, learning and sharing
at the event.
The call for poster abstracts is now open.
The event team is looking for poster
abstracts that showcase good examples
of how your work embeds NHSScotland
quality ambitions and how it is taking
forward the priority areas identified for
action in the journey towards the 2020
Vision.
Completed abstract forms should be emailed to Clifford Burden, Poster Coordinator at clifford.burden@nhs.net no
later than 6 March 2015.
Further information can be found on the
intranet.
This is your site newsletter and we want to hear from you about what’s going on in
your service.
Please send stories to Laura.Mancini@nhslothian.scot.nhs.uk