Staff briefing roundup

Welcome – Rob Gerlis

• New starters – Shivon Genus – supporting the PALS team as the Interim Patient Experience Manager and Micaela Bubb, Cancer Screening Co-ordinator

General update – Peter Wightman

• Vaccinations update
  • The deadline to complete over 70s, health and care social workers, housebound vaccinations is 15 February
  • It is expected, even after this date, for work to continue with these cohorts
  • Change to national communications message – over 70s and clinically vulnerable who have not yet received a vaccine can now proactively seek one
  • We have not been set any targets beyond 15 February
  • We have been told to expect lower vaccine quantities , these lower rates will still be enough to achieve the second dose
  • Vaccination centre in Bishop’s Stortford is now live
  • Optimistic we will meet the 15 Feb deadline
  • People with learning difficulties are set to be vaccinated in cohort 6
  • White paper – detailing the aspiration to get changes to the Health Act – CCGs moving to ICS
  • Headline position is nothing is different to what we have communicated before

• Stephen Fry – East of England is back below national average and coming down in each of our localities (Epping, Harlow and Uttlesford)

• Toni Coles – COVID positive numbers have gone down to 83
• PAH are on OPEL 3
• The challenge is getting the bed base right, there are significant numbers of patients waiting for a bed

Local update – Ian Tompkins

• Vaccinations – working with colleagues across public health and local authorities to reach the hard to reach groups e.g. the homeless
• Annual leave – we encourage you to take time off between now and the end of the financial year. Read the Annual leave carry over news story
• Staff survey results should be coming out at the beginning of March
• Reminder: you can still book your vaccination at Harlow Leisurezone
• Issues with mobile testing units across Essex – people turning up late due to the weather conditions and some sites have been closed, but we are directing people to alternative sites so they can still get tested
• Cold weather warnings – please continue to work from home unless you can’t. This week’s weather looks like it will be very cold, so stay safe and stay at home

Mailbox archive – Alan Hicks

• • All migrations onto new NHS services are complete
  • Archive has been built into the system – you should see it on the left hand side of your email
  • It is also available through the NHSmail portal
  • if you have any storage issues in your main inbox, you can put mail into the archive to create more space
  • This archive is more secure, you can auto archive it and search in it like the normal inbox
  • We are organising two short training sessions after half term (w/c 22 February) and will circulate the dates shortly

Any other business

• Mid-week mindfulness is on Wednesday 10 January at 12.30pm – To access the session login to Microsoft Teams and go to the ‘Staff Room’ channel by clicking on the Teams icon on the left-hand menu. You may have to click on ‘hidden channels’ for the Staff Room to appear or type ‘Staff Room’ in the search bar at the top