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| Here's me (top) and Sarah Davidson (bottom) |
We’ve just had learning disability week, the Windrush anniversary, and even national optimism day!
Yes, the ‘staying connected’ theme for learning disability week was adapted for the particularly harsh impact of lockdown on this group. But we all need friendship and support, and never more so than during this challenging period.
The second-ever Windrush Day on Monday marked the legacy of the Windrush generation, as well as a chance to show solidarity and support for the hardships many have had to suffer since coming to this country.
I don’t know if you watched the BBC drama, ‘Sitting in Limbo’, or the documentary, ‘The Unwanted: The secret Windrush files’, but I felt myself wanting to shout at the TV again. I was shocked to hear in this damming documentary that, even before arriving, politicians in Westminster were frantically scheming about how they could prevent a ship carrying hundreds of people with a legitimate right to live here from docking in the UK.
I’d naively thought that these British citizens from the Commonwealth were wanted and were being welcomed to help build war-torn Britain. But even in the fifties we were already creating the 'hostile environment' that we have seen endure since. No one should feel proud of Britain after watching this programme.
This week also brought news about the further release of lockdown measures, with our own 4th July 'Independence Day' and celebration when pubs, hairdressers and cinemas can re-open. Even more importantly, families can now visit each other and stay in each other's houses, so long as we still maintain social distancing. This virus has certainly shone a bright light on the things that really matter, with separated partners and families talking of their joy at being able to visit and spend time together.
I do however totally get that there’s still a lot of anxiety about our new freedoms. The lockdown has made many of us anxious, and for a lot of people returning to ‘normal’ might be very scary. I heard a couple of young people talking on the radio about the anxiety they were feeling at the thought of doing 'normal' things like going to the pub. The bottom line is, although the measures are being relaxed, we are far from the normality of three months ago.
And I know the anxiety people are feeling in general is playing out here within our organisation, and I know you need to know that we are moving forward in a safe and planned way. We will not be rushing to return to how things were back in March.
Our ‘appreciative enquiry’ work is now almost complete for both clinical and corporate services. We are also close to completing the risk assessments necessary to develop our 'working safely' plan, which will set out how we will deliver services and provide corporate support services for the rest of the year. We shared a communication earlier this week advising that for now, people should continue with the existing arrangements. With schools out until at least September, we know that it is difficult for many of our staff with caring responsibilities. So there is no expectation that, with the recent changes to lockdown, we expect people to suddenly change their working arrangements. As soon as we can, we will share the 'working safely' plans more fully.
As well as working through how people should be working over the rest of the year, we are also working on what we should be focusing on. Using your experience from the appreciative enquiry and thinking about how we can best deliver the expected surge in demand, we are reviewing our priorities to refresh our annual business plan for this year. As I said in an earlier blog, our big ambitions have not changed, but our world has, so we need to reflect that – we hope to have the refreshed plan within the next month.
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Sarah Davidson, Head of Safeguarding
When COVID-19 hit the headlines, we realised that the demand on NHS frontline staff and lockdown was going to change the world of work as we knew it.
Our safeguarding team, which consists of a number of nurses, experienced an overwhelming urge to get to the frontline and help colleagues in any way that we could. Most of us, as part of our careers, had worked in a variety of clinical roles across a number of different organisations and felt we had a lot to offer.
Like many people, we were watching the videos of NHS staff trying to shop after long shifts where many of the shelves were empty, and clapping for the NHS and the amazing work our staff were doing on a Thursday.
The modern matrons share our office at Trust Headquarters and we watched as they became busier. We offered support where we could, which mainly consisted of making cups of tea, ensuring snacks were in the cupboard and photocopying infection control and PPE information for the wards.
We talked as a team about how we could get to the frontline at a time of national crisis. In each nurse, there was an uncontrollable urge to want to care for people and support our colleagues, so we were thrilled to be given the opportunity to undertake a clinical refresher, getting us one step closer to where we wanted to be.
So over three weeks, five members of our team attended the clinical refresher course. Uniforms were ordered and we were then available for redeployment. Very quickly, there was a request for support from the Stockport drug and alcohol team and one of our team, who had previously worked in the service, volunteered to support and was off to the frontline.
I was approached on a number of occasions for further redeployment opportunities and those who had undertaken the clinical refresher were on standby.
All along, I was mindful that we had to continue to offer safeguarding support, advice and guidance to staff, so we could fulfil our statutory responsibilities to promote the welfare of children and young people and protect adults at risk of abuse: enabling them to retain independence, wellbeing, dignity and choice.
A couple of weeks into lockdown, I attended a multi-agency meeting and was able to give assurances that frontline staff continued to have access to safeguarding support through the normal channels, but as demand was reduced that some of the team had been redeployed. At this meeting, a colleague from another organisation said that we have our own safeguarding ‘frontline’ and we’re on this frontline because of our knowledge, skills and expertise. I realised this was an important message to take back to the team: to remind them that, just because we are not on the wards in our uniforms, we are not on the frontline.
The measures to contain and delay the spread of covid are presenting major stressors for families which they can’t control. We need to continue to recognise when children, adults and families are struggling or potentially suffering abuse or neglect and refer them to other agencies, as well as support vulnerable patients where possible.
Children and adults will continue to be abused and neglected throughout this time. Some may be at higher risk. For many vulnerable patients and families, contact with our services might be one of the few professional contacts they have. During consultations, we need to consider if they could be experiencing significant harm and safeguard appropriately: be professionally curious.
For victims of domestic abuse, household isolation could mean they are at additional risk of abuse; trapped in their homes with their abusers and isolated from the people and the resources that could help them. Subtle signs of abuse and/or neglect may not be as obvious during phone or video consultations. Victims of abuse may be unable to speak freely if consulting from home.
It’s vital we keep communication channels open with other health and social care professionals who are involved in the care of vulnerable children and adults. Please continue to share information as you would normally for the purposes of safeguarding.
So as nurses, there is still that urge to don our uniforms and head off to the wards. But like other teams who are working ‘behind the scenes’, we are valuing our contribution and understanding that each and every one of us has valuable knowledge, skills and expertise in our own areas of work that are crucial at this time.
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Best wishes,
Claire
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