Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
Nicola Adams
opens Unit that cares for her Coach
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Jessop Fertility Winter 2013
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Page 10 A magazine for staff and patients
Welcome to the Winter edition of LINK magazine. I am always incredibly proud to tell people I work for Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and this edition of LINK demonstrates exactly why I feel that way. As well as the usual packed pages of news, we also feature the winners of this year’s Thank You Awards in which over 120 teams and individuals were nominated. This is the highest number we have ever had. Every single nomination was worthy of being a finalist and the extent to which our colleagues have gone above and beyond their paid roles to ensure we continue to provide safe, high quality, efficient care was staggering. Innovation played a key role in this year’s awards and indeed STH colleagues have also scooped the prestigious Medipex awards for Innovation in 3 of the 6 categories. New ways of working and increased partnership working between acute, community and social care colleagues was also very evident at the Thank You awards. This will be critical as we move into the winter period with all the challenges it brings and the need to ensure we can keep patients flowing through our services with limited delays. This will ensure we have the capacity to treat the increase in emergency patients we know we will see. Finally I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for all your work so far this year and assure you that we will be doing everything possible to ensure we have robust plans in place to manage the winter pressures. But of course I am only too aware that the plans will only be successful with the support of you and your colleagues. I hope you enjoy reading the rest of the magazine.
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Recognising those behind the scenes
H
otel Services are one of the largest directorates within the Trust and provide a range of essential services that support the day to day running of the hospitals for example catering, domestics, laundry, security, portering, transport, car parking, accommodation, waste management.
Many of the 1800 staff in Hotel Services are dedicated employees that consistently provide outstanding levels of service or continually perform above and beyond expectations. However, due to the nature of their work this dedication can often go unoticed. As a result, the Hotel Services Management team have decided to introduce an employee of the quarter scheme. Below are the Hotel services colleagues who were nominated at the end of June this year:
Peter Mullins – Laundry
1st Place
Andrew Purvis – Domestics
2nd Place
Chris Peat – Transport
3rd Place
Adam Hinchcliffe – Portering
Merit
Craig Stevenson – Domestics
Merit
Emma Hague – Domestics
Merit
Frank Greathead – Catering
Merit
Jackie Morton – Catering
Merit
Katie Paterson – Domestics
Merit
Margaret Nelson – Domestics
Merit
Mark Owen – Domestics
Merit
Tracey Hague – Domestics
Merit
Peter Mullins was recognised for his prompt actions when he discovered a major steam leak in the laundry on a weekend. Peter quickly moved the other staff in the department to a safe environment, contacted Estates to get the steam shut and avoided thousands of pounds worth of potential damage to machinery. He then contacted a member of the management team to make them aware of the issue and cleared up any water caused by the leak. Peter said “I think the awards are a brilliant idea and I was honoured to have been nominated and very proud to receive first prize, both for myself and the department”. Second place went to Andrew Purvis. Andrew’s substantive role is that of supervisor at Firth Park Clinic. However, his flexibility and support is invaluable to the Domestic Management team. Andrew goes above and beyond the call of duty on a continuous basis to make sure services in the community are maintained and in many ways is our first stage contingency plan. Third place went to Chris Peat, who managed to keep services running despite the Waste Compactor breaking down for 3 days. Chris emptied all the black household
bins by hand, thus preventing waste backing up on the Wards. I’m sure most people can appreciate just how much waste is produced across the NGH in a single day and how busy Chris must have been. All nominees were extremely pleased with being nominated and the recognition received for their continued efforts.
Winner Peter Mullins with Director of Hotel Services Kevin O’Regan
Patients give Hospitals top marks for cleanliness, dignity and food standards
The Trust has received praise for ward cleanliness, respecting patient’s dignity and the quality of food from independent inspectors as part of a new national set of assessments to ensure high standards are met.
W
e were a pilot centre for the innovative Patient Led-Assessment of the Care Environment (PLACE) which give staff and patients the opportunity to be inspectors in a bid to drive improvements in care settings. The inspectors looked at four key areas which were scored out
of 100%. The Northern General, Royal Hallamshire (which includes the Jessop Wing) and Weston Park Hospitals as well as Beech Hill Intermediate Care Unit all scored over 99% for cleanliness, over 93% for privacy, dignity and wellbeing, over 90% for condition, appearance & maintenance and ranged from 87% - 96% for food. Kevin O’Regan, Hotel Services Director, said: “These assessments are a fantastic way to give patients
and the public a voice that can be heard in any discussion about local standards of care. Our staff have worked extremely hard to deliver good standards in the four key domains of PLACE in all our Trust facilities. We work in partnership with ward staff and infection control specialists to enhance cleaning standards and introduced rapid-response and deep clean teams as part of the ongoing drive to prevent infections. This has already helped
to reduce infections including a 40% reduction in Cdifficile cases compared to 2011/12. Ward refurbishments/upgrades have also improved environmental standards on an ongoing basis and we continue to provide good nutrition and hydration, with a greater choice of food for our patients. This will improve further by 2014 following completion of our £7+ million catering infrastructure investment. Whilst we have posted an excellent set of results we will continue to make every effort to sustain and improve our scores, wherever possible, to deliver our key objective to provide high quality services for our patients.”
Cancer patients praise care in Sheffield A comprehensive review of NHS cancer care by the Department of Health has found that our patients receive excellent care. The 2013 National Cancer Patient Experience Survey rated STH within the top 20% of Trusts in various areas, including: • Staff always treating patients with respect and dignity • Staff giving complete explanations of what would be done
• S taff doing everything they could to control pain 91% of patients rated their overall care as ‘excellent’ or ’very good’ which is higher than the national average of 88%. The Trust did not score in the lowest 20% of Trusts for any of the questions in the survey, which was designed to monitor national progress on cancer care and to provide information that could be used to drive local quality improvements.
Chris Morley, Deputy Chief Nurse, said: “I am delighted that the 2013 National Cancer Patient Experience Survey has rated our services so highly. This survey is an excellent way for us to review our care and I am pleased to say we have seen improvements from last year’s positive report. All of our staff are passionate about the care that they give to patients and we pride ourselves on giving a professional high quality caring service.” Page 3 • Link - Winter 2013