Tag: north east essex

Posted on

NHS Rehabilitation Service

ne-essex-ccgNew rehabilitation service to open at Clacton Hospital

More help is now available for people who need rehabilitation after illness or injury to get back to living at home. A brand new service, the Durban Rehabilitation Centre, has just opened at Clacton Hospital.

Generally those who need the service will be people over 65, but any adults who may need more time and more support and who do not need nursing care will be welcome. People will be looked after in a bed at the Durban Rehabilitation Centre so they are safe while they work with staff at their own pace to re-gain their skills and abilities to live safely in the community. Some people will need rehabilitation after they have been in hospital at Colchester, but others may be admitted directly from home after a referral by their GP or the new Rapid Assessment Service.

NHS North East Essex Clinical Commissioning Group agreed the project, and colleagues from Essex County Council, our local NHS community service provider Anglian Community Enterprise (ACE) and the Clacton Hospital site’s owners have worked rapidly to get the new service ready in time for winter. Their efforts mean the service has opened ahead of schedule – new handrails, doors, practical aids, a kitchen for patients’ use and re-decorating has just been finished, to provide a much brighter, homely look to help people get their physical abilities and their confidence back, after an injury or illness.

ACE’s trained rehabilitation staff will run the Centre, supported by a GP and ACE’s community nurses. The Centre has 15 beds and will have a minimum of three staff on duty at any time. The Centre will care for people from both the Colchester and Tendring areas, and will run until at least April 2015, when it will be evaluated and compared with other ways of providing similar care, to ensure the NHS can offer the best quality and most efficient service to local people in the future. The unit is very much welcomed as an extra resource over the winter period, when the whole NHS health “system” is traditionally under greatest pressure.

Lisa Llewelyn, Director of Nursing and Clinical Quality at the CCG said:

This innovative new unit is a really important service for our community, and shows how joint working across organisations can bring real benefit for local people.  It will offer high-quality rehabilitation to people from Colchester and Tendring who might otherwise face real problems in getting back to good health in their own home. It’s very much part of our drive to help people stay out of acute hospital beds and remain safe in their own home. The improvements to the Durban Centre environment should prove a desirable option for people with these particular needs. It’s always amazing how much detailed effort goes into making a new service work, but each and every person who is helped to get back to a good quality of life makes that all very worthwhile!

http://antibioticguardian.com/
Share
Posted on

NHS Maternity Review

ne-essex-ccgExternal Review of Maternity Services provided by Colchester Hospital University NHS Foundation Trust

An external review of maternity services across North East Essex has been published by North East Essex Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG) and Colchester Hospital University NHS Foundation Trust (the Trust).  The review by the NHS England Strategic Clinical Network, which was jointly commissioned by the Trust and the CCG, noted much good practice and commended the enthusiasm and commitment to women and their families. Out of a total of 19 recommendations in the report, there was just one major concern requiring immediate action. The report recommended that the Trust should ensure the delivery suite at Colchester General Hospital should have an extra (supernumerary) senior midwife on duty in line with a previous recommendation by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists (RCOG). Work is already underway to ensure the Trust meets this recommendation.  The report also comments on the small number of women giving birth at the midwife-led units at the community hospitals in Clacton and Harwich, stating there are insufficient births to warrant a 24 hours a day 7 days a week service. It adds that the need to cover three sites is part of the difficulty in meeting the midwife to birth ratio recommendation from the RCOG. Lisa Llewelyn, Director of Nursing and Clinical Quality at the CCG, said:

The report gives the CCG external assurance about the service and supports us in preparing for consultation with the public on a sustainable and safe service. We note the comments around the number of births at the midwife-led units at Clacton and Harwich but are also conscious of the need to provide choice of birth location as recently proposed in draft guidelines by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence.

Amanda Hallums, Divisional Director of Women’s and Children’s Services at the Trust, said:

We are grateful to the Peer Review Team for carrying out a very thorough review. We welcome the findings of the report as it identifies many strengths and areas of good practice. We will be working jointly with the maternity multidisciplinary team and CCG colleagues to address the recommendations.”

Commissioned to assess opportunities for improvement in and to assess the viability of births from three sites across North East Essex (Colchester, Clacton and Harwich), the report’s 19 recommendations were grouped under the following headings:

  • Clinical governance
  • Operational efficacy
  • Clinical  leadership

Included in the recommendations were:

  • An urgent review of midwifery staffing together with clinical pathways, patient information, communication, quality and governance
  • Annual review of staffing to ensure resources match demand
  • A wider Essex review of maternity services
  • Build on good practice to ensure continuous improvement including reviewing risk management structures and clinical governance
  • Boards of both organisations need to ensure they have sight of outcomes as well as performance
Share
Accessibility by WAH