Health Services

This is a collaborative event between the National End of Life Care Programme abd NHS London to launch the national E-Learning in End of Life Care for All (e-ELCA)

e- ELCA is an exciting and free on-line resource to help train and educate health and social care staff delivering end of life care. For more information visit the website www.e-elca.org.uk.

REASONS TO ATTEND

• Dr Bee Wee, Senior Clinical Lecturer in palliative Medicine at Oxford University will be presenting on the development of the e-ELCA resource.
• Test drive e-ELCA training modules and hear from the experts.

This is an exciting and essential event suitable for:

• Senior managers and clinician in health and social care organistions.
• Local education leads in health and socila care orgamisations.
• E-Learning leads from across health and social care.
• Those who mentor colleagues whose work involves end of life care.
• Anyone whose work involves caring for those approaching the end of life and would like an early look at what the new resources offers.

to book your free place go to www.eventprouk.com click on EVENT REGISTRATION then input:

username: EP1152 (Please use capital letters)

password: EL250310 (Please note that 0+ zero and use capital letters)

Wandsworth LINk’s decision to refer NHS Wandsworth’s plans for the Battersea polyclinic hub to the Council’s Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee was the subject of an article in the Wandsworth Guardian today. 

For the full articles please see archived edition 04/02/2010 page 5 in http://edition.pagesuite-professional.co.uk/Launch.aspx?refresh=d06W9gP1sL05&PBID=47c1cbbd-4d2d-409e-8458-8703ef40dcda

Why is the LINk is referring the NHS Wandsworth decision on the Battersea polyclinic hub to the Council’s Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee? 

 Wandsworth LINk has now sent Wandsworth Council its reasons for referring the recent NHS Wandsworth decision to create a split-site polyclinic hub for Battersea, to its health Overview and Scrutiny Committee for further analysis. 

Wandsworth LINk considers the new plan to be a substantial change from the previous one and should therefore be exposed to public consultation.  The split-site service will inconvenience patients, sometimes requiring attendances at both sites to deal with a single problem.  The availability of capital finance is being given as the recent for the change of plan.  There was a solution for this in 2008.  Is that solution not available today?  For the full reasons for referral please see attached note.  The Committee will be held in public at Wandsworth Town Hall at 7.30 pm on Tuesday 16th February.

Why are Wandsworth LINk referring the NHS Wandsworth Polyclinic decision to the Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee

Keep your child safe from swine flu this winter

All children over six months and under five years of age in Wandsworth are now being offered the swine flu vaccine.  The under fives are most at risk from swine flu and more likely to need hospital care than any other age group.

GPs across Wandsworth are offering the vaccine and parents of eligible children will be contacted directly by their GP.

Local GP Tom Coffey said: “Even if your child is healthy, it’s extremely important to get them vaccinated again swine flu.  Children can easily catch and pass on the swine flu virus and unfortunately we’ve seen higher rates of hospitalisation in the under fives.”

“It’s impossible to know if you’re child has already had swine flu unless they’ve had a positive laboratory test for the virus.  Our advice to parents is therefore, don’t take a chance, the swine flu vaccination will keep your child safe this winter.”

The under fives are the latest group to be offered the swine flu vaccine.  The vaccine is already being offered to

• Adults and children between six months and 65 years of age in the current seasonal flu vaccine clinical ‘at risk’ groups. e.g. who have a long-term health condition, including chronic lung disease and heart disease;
• Pregnant women;
• People who live in the same house as someone whose immune system is compromised by disease or treatment, and
• People aged 65 and over in the current seasonal flu vaccine clinical “at risk” groups.

For more information on swine flu, visit  www.nhs.uk or call the Swine Flu Information Line on 0800 1 513 513.

At its meeting on Monday evening, the Council’s Health Overview and Scrutiny Committee discussed a report on “Information for Choice” in the NHS. This report identified the various sources of information available to local residents who want to find out more about the quality of different local healthcare services in order to help them make a sensible choice about where they should go fro treatment. In an appendix to the report, Wandsworth LINk provided comments about some of the gaps in the information provided by NHS Wandsworth and the NHS Choices website about local services. These gaps were generally due to missing or misleading information. NHS Wandsworth, in its reply to the report, noted the issues and stated that most of the problems would be overcome when their new website was launched later this year.

To read LINk’s comments click here Informed Choice

At it’s recent Board Meeting NHS Wandsworth selected St George’s Hospital Trust as its preferred organisation to take on the Wandsworth Community Services as it separates from the Primary Care Trust.

The PCT also received a detailed report of the events leading up to the voluntary liquidation of Secure Healthcare, the social enterprise providing healthcare services to inmates of Wandsworth Prison.  In discussing the report, it was recognised that it was difficult to balance the financial risk of accepting a tender from an untried organisation, against the improvement in services such an organisation might achieve.

To read the full report click below:

Notes from the Wandsworth PCT Board, 2nd December

The health of people living in Wandsworth has been recognised as good in an independent review of local public services published on 9th October.

Oneplace, known formally as the Comprehensive Area Assessment , brings together the work of the Audit Commission, Ofsted, the Care Quality Commission and Her Majesty’s Inspectorates of Constabulary, Probation and Prisons to assess how well local partners such as the NHS, council, police, fire and rescue services are working together to tackle local priorities in Wandsworth.

The assessment shows that Wandsworth is performing significantly better than the England average in some key areas, including reducing smoking in pregnancy and encouraging adults to eat healthily and be physically active. Wandsworth also compares well for new mothers breast feeding their babies, reducing adult obesity and rates of diabetes.

Amanda Philpott, Deputy Chief Executive, NHS Wandsworth said

“It is extremely important for us that we work in association with a range of organisations including the local council, social services, and community and voluntary groups when finding solutions for better healthcare in the borough. We are very pleased with the outcome of the CAA but remain focused on pushing standards in local healthcare by improving access, quality and choice of health care services, particularly for those people in Wandsworth’s most deprived communities.”

“We are delighted that Oneplace recognises the success we’ve achieved together with our local partners in the borough to promote good health in Wandsworth and in particular to address health inequalities.

“Oneplace is a welcome addition to existing healthcare assessments as it brings together information from different sectors to look at the joint goal of improving quality of life for our local people.

Do you agree with this report? What could NHS Wandsworth do to improve local residents health even more?

A&E and ‘Urgent care’ are at the top of the list of topics in this feedback from the November meeting of the PEC committee with the NHS Wandsworth Management Team. Londoners are very keen – rather too keen – on using their A&E departments. Emergency and unplanned hospital admissions are running about 9% ahead of the planned provision. 7pm is the peak time which strongly suggests, writes Andrew, that is the time when GP should be offering walk in services. People going to A&E are saying they cannot see their GPs then. Do the younger residents of Wandsworth who come from parts of Europe where hospital is the first stop and primary care facilities like GPs are not the norm, understand how things work here? Andrew calls for a look at ways of changing the ways many of us are using A&E departments to make sure we all know that there are lots of places other than A&E to get urgent treatment.

Will the Primary Care Scorecard help?

Soon you will be seeing a table that ranks GP performance in a way that will be intelligible and useable for members of the public. This will be the ‘Primary Care Scorecard’ which will make comparisons between local GP practices. Andrew hopes that the final version of the scorecard will show both individual practices who are poor performers and areas of service where particular practices are performing poorly. He calls for action by the PCT to decommission consistently failing practices, tell their patients why and find them alternatives which offer better quality service.

Are You Ready to Share?

There is a system whereby your records can be shared over something called the EMIS Web System. This makes your medical records available when you are being treated in an emergency when looking at your GP medical notes or hospital records may not be possible. You will be asked for your consent for this sharing by your GP (if you have not been already). You have the right to take a look at them before they are uploaded to check their accuracy. The PEC committee are going to do a Privacy Impact Assessment to make sure that this is all in the patients’ interests.

Next Meetings

Andrew Craig reports in his capacity as the Lay Member on the PEC committee which regularly meets with the Wandsworth PCT management. The PEC meets again on 1st December and the NHS Wandsworth Board on 2nd December. This is a public meeting and you can find information about time and place here.

The Wandsworth LINk wants you to be aware of the following important advice from NHS Wandsworth

At risk residents are urged to get the swine flu vaccine

The NHS is urging local residents to take up the swine flu vaccination. The vaccine is being offered first to people most likely to become seriously ill if they catch swine flu.

The priority groups for vaccination are:

· Adults and children between six months and 65 years of age in the current seasonal flu vaccine clinical ‘at risk’ groups. e.g. who have a long-term health condition, including chronic lung disease and heart disease;

· Pregnant women;

· People who live in the same house as someone whose immune system is compromised by disease or treatment, and

· People aged 65 and over in the current seasonal flu vaccine clinical “at risk” groups.

NHS Wandsworth’s Joint Medical Director, Dr Dave Finch said: “We know that for the majority of cases swine flu is a mild illness, but for some people, mostly with other existing health problems, it can be more serious. The vaccine is our best line of defence against swine flu, and I urge everyone in the priority groups to take up the offer of being vaccinated. Your GP will contact you to let you know if you are in one of the at-risk groups.”

Residents in the priority groups who are not registered with a GP can arrange to have their free swine vaccination at Tooting Walk-in Centre by calling 020 8700 0505.

Clinic times are:

Wednesday 11, 18 and 25 November 4pm – 7pm

Thursday 12, 19 and 26 November 7am – 10am

Saturday 14, 21 and 28 November 5.30pm – 8pm

Dr Finch continued “We are seeing increasing numbers of cases in the local community and the number of people catching the illness may rise as we move into the winter season Being vaccinated against swine flu is voluntary but the NHS wants to protect as many people in the community as possible. ”

The swine flu vaccines have under-gone a series of stringent tests to be granted a licence by the European Medicines Agency and have undergone extensive trials involving thousands of people.”

One of the best things that everyone can do to protect themselves and others from swine flu and ordinary seasonal flu is to follow good basic hygiene, said Dr Finch, especially covering your nose and mouth when coughing or sneezing, placing used tissues in a bin and remembering to wash your hands frequently with soap and water to reduce the spread of the virus.”

The swine flu vaccination will not protect you against seasonal flu so if you are at-risk it is important to have both vaccinations.”

For more information on swine flu, visit www.nhs.uk or call the Swine Flu Information Line on 0800 1 513 513.

NHS Wandsworth Changes Plans

Although NHS Wandsworth have consulted on polyclinic developments across the borough, it is likely that several of the new polyclinic hubs which were planned to bring a wide range of services together on a single local site will not now be developed. Of greatest concern are the changes to the plans for north Wandsworth and Battersea. The key hub for this area was going to be a new comprehensive primary care centre in Grant Road which would have provided primary healthcare and an urgent care centre with a wide range of diagnostic equipment on site.

Use of existing and other planned facilities

The new centre is not now likely to be built, with local residents having to rely on facilities contained within St John’s Therapy Centre and the new primary care centre to be opened next year under the railway arches at Clapham Junction.

Will the new services offer what is needed?

The key question is whether there will now be the complete range of healthcare services provided on a single site near Clapham Junction to offer a real alternative to local A&E services for residents needing urgent care. The review of polyclinic developments across the whole Borough will be reported to the PCT Board at the beginning of December 2009.

What is the Wandsworth LINk doing about this?

Wandsworth LINk representatives, as part of their campaign to seek improvements to local health and social care services, will be trying to ensure that NHS Wandsworth comes up with a plan for urgent care services in north Wandsworth and Battersea which will match the facilities available to residents of other parts of the Borough at hospitals such as Queen Mary’s Roehampton and St George’s.

If you have comments on this development, please use the comment box.