#TeamMKUH - The Yearbook 2020 / 2021

TheMKWay CARE. COMMUNICATE. COLLABORATE. CONTRIBUTE.

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Milton Keynes University Hospital

NHS Foundation Trust

#TeamMKUH The Yearbook

2020-2021

Divisions

Teams in the Spotlight

VACCINATION CENTRE #TeamMKUH set up one of the country's first vaccination centres in an operation that involved dozens of staff seconded to convert the Academic Centre into a place where patients and staff could receive their vaccinations.

After opening on 8 December 2020, almost 35,000 vaccinations were administered to MKUH staff, patients, members of the public and other health and social care workers. This includes vaccinating the first couple in the East of England, when Arthur (86) and Barbara (82) attended on the opening day with the UK's media watching on.

The success of the vaccination centre is the result of phenomenal achievements from so many staff from all areas of the hospital and beyond who have worked relentlessly to provide the best possible service. Our centre finally closed its doors on 31 March 2021.

Helen Chadwick, Clinical Director for Pharmacy, who led our vaccination programme, said: "I am exceptionally proud of what everyone has achieved in delivering a safe, compassionate and caring service. Over 400 people from across many walks of life and teams in MKUH came together to become one team with a single goal and I want to thank every single one of them for the amazing job they did.'

Helen shared some further thoughts on the importance of our vaccination centre.

How challenging was it to set up the vaccination centre in a short space of time?

"Very. MKUH set this up alongside running normal services and staff went over and above to make it happen. However, everyone was enormously proud to be part of making such a huge contribution to the national effort to get us through these challenging times.''

How did staff pull together as a team to respond to the pandemic?

"The centre took staff from across all areas of the hospital to come together as one and make it happen. Many people took on new roles that they had never done before and those with office-based roles became patient facing. The response was phenomenal.''

BONE PRONE TEAM

During the peaks of the COVID-19 pandemic, many teams across the Trust were required to work differently to support the care of patients.

However for some members of #TeamMKUH, this change in their work was driven by a desire and determination to support their fellow colleagues to ease the significant pressure they were consistently under. We caught up with Dr Oliver Pearce to find out more.

What was the Bone Prone team and why were they established?

"Proning is the act of turning a patient on to their front to improve their oxygenation. At the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, almost all patients in our Intensive Care Unit needed to be proned which required careful management to ensure this was done safely. Several members of staff were needed to support every patient which, when the ICU was already operating above capacity, was a challenge.”

"Mr Andrew Hacker (Consultant Orthopaedic Surgeon) started the Bone Prone Team during the first lockdown, quickly followed by Mr Joel Humphrey and then myself. We set up a rota and the registrars in Trauma and Orthopaedics also contributed.”

Who did this initiative involve? ''During the second lockdown we started it up again. Only this time there was a combination of orthopaedic surgeons and non-clinical managerial staff from the Trauma and Orthopaedics department. Special mention must go out to Luca Seminerio who took it entirely upon himself to run a rota of volunteers and people he could convince and cajole to help.” ''During the second lockdown, this service of volunteers also included weekends to support with the added capacity and pressure.”

How did the initiative operate alongside your work at the time? Was all of your other work postponed? ''During our first lockdown we (in Trauma and Orthopaedics) were in a 'surge rota' which meant we had quite a few free sessions between allocated work, so it was very easy to predict when we would have free time to come and be on the Bone Prone team. ''In the second lockdown, there was no cessation of normal activities (elective operating stopped, but we were often allocated remote clinics instead), so there was a lot less free time, and hence Luca's job of coordinating the Bone Prone rota became a lot more labour intensive and it probably would have fallen short but for his efforts. Volunteering at weekends was generally a bit easier as we were free of our clinical commitments.”

Outstanding Contribution Awards

Surgery

Corporate

Women’s and Children’s

Medicine