Staff briefing roundup

Welcome – Rob Gerlis

General update – Peter Wightman

• Vaccinations update
• Programme is progressing well and the 15 February target is looking achievable
• Start to turn to second doses. Patients and staff are to go back to where they got their first one
• Lister House second doses start third week of February
• PAH and Herts second doses start 5/6 March
• Vaccination centre is due to open in Bishop’s Stortford
• Latest data in the community (31 Jan) – to be uploaded
• As of 31 Jan – summary position for ICS
• Stephenen Fry – seeing good improvement across top four cohorts
• Within over 80 groups –we are starting to pick up health inequalities angle, finding that ethnic groups are choosing to opt out of vaccinations
• This will become a massive part of this programme as we move onto more cohorts
• Regarding NHS frontline workers we are in a strong position, but within care homes there is lower uptake from the staff
• Working to uplift care home workers vaccination rates
• Staff survey results are coming back – we will discuss at Exec and will feedback to everyone
• Care homes – David Wallace
• Slowly improving, a reducing number of homes with outbreaks and they are getting over the worst
• Working with primary care regarding the vaccine rollout in homes – more positive than it was a couple of weeks ago
• Toni Coles – PAH
• PAH remain on OPEL 2 – steady state
• COVID numbers are at 117 – rates are reducing compared to the past data
• Issues still remain around staffing
• Trying to create green capacity in our community wards, ensuring intermediate care beds at Abbots are green
• Rob Gerlis – the three CCG Boards met virtually for the first time last week. It went well minus a few technical difficulties
• Everyone from each system had their say, overall a great start
• A big thank you to Simone Surgenor for setting this up along with members of the other CCGs.
• Simone – thank you to everyone from the CCG that worked together to make this joint board meeting happen
• Introducing Emma Nicol – supporting the recovery work and overseeing the ICS transformation programme

Volunteering opportunities – Jess Steele

• Within west Essex we have five PCN vaccination sites in place across Epping Forest, Harlow and Uttlesford as well asHarlow Leisurezone
• Each district has its own route to enable you to volunteer, so please follow the relevant links in the email sent out last week
• If you would like to specifically volunteer for Harlow Leisurezone, please express your interest by emailing covidimmseoi@nhs.net where it is expected your NHS status means your expression of interest will be fast tracked
• If you have any queries, please email Jessica Steele

Local update – Ian Tompkins

• Pop up Lunch and Learn sessions launching soon
• We have a stock of lateral flow testing kits – for patient-facing staff, asked colleagues to put names forward to Jackie Hall for distribution
• Personal health budget orders – any questions about this please contact Ian/Jackie
• Update on vaccinations – working on a centre in Loughton at Murray Hall (confidential)
• Reminder about risk assessments – complete by end of the week
• Working closely with EPUT to explore sites in other areas on our patch
• Reminder on PAH vaccinations – first doses will stop at 3pm today (2 February) but staff can continue to book at Harlow Leisurezone
• PAH is holding its next public engagement event on Thursday evening. If you’d like to know more about the new hospital project feel free to join. We will include joining details in the staff newsletter on Thursday

World Cancer Day – Emma Harnett – Macmillan Primary Care Nurse Facilitator and Iolanda Cuomo – Cancer Campaigns Manager

• Cancer Initiatives in West Essex CCG – view PowerPoint presentation

 Your questions 

 Q. Does the 70+ cohort include clinically vulnerable under 70?

• The graphs shown in Peter’s presentation for the top four Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) cohorts will not currently include Clinically Extremely Vulnerable (CEV) under 70s
• The over 70s numbers are captured as part of their age band numbers
• The key point is there are national and local processes in place to ensure that CEV under 70s are offered and administered the vaccine
• The numbers will form part of the overall vaccines delivered, but not possible to split them out currently for reporting
• They are being done in line for the 15 February target date

Q. What sites are planned in Uttlesford?

• Bishop’s Stortford will cover Uttlesford and east Herts side and the primary care network site at the Saffron Walden centre