Red carpet treatment for NHS staff at glittering Care Trust awards night (From Bradford Telegraph and Argus)

Red carpet treatment for NHS staff at glittering Care Trust awards night

7:00am Tuesday 19th March 2013 in News

The hard work and dedication of local NHS staff was celebrated at a glittering Oscar-style ceremony to honour their outstanding achievements over the past year.

Bradford District Care Trust rolled out the red carpet last night to welcome about 300 guests to the National Media Museum and reveal the winners of the five award categories, and £1,000 to be used within their work, in its annual ‘You’re A Star Awards’.

Trust chief executive Simon Large told how proud he was of all the staff, before revealing the positive results of a national staff survey that looked into 28 areas of good practice.

Mr Large revealed that 26 of those areas, the Trust scored “average or above” ratings. In ten of the areas, it was in the top 20 per cent of every Trust in the country.

“We were the highest scoring of like-organisations across Yorkshire and the Humber,” said Mr Large.

The Trust provides community health, mental health and social care services for people across the Bradford, Airedale and Craven areas, as well as specialist support for people with learning disabilities.

The five award categories were based around the Trust’s values of respect, openness, improvement, excellence, and togetherness.

Louise McChrystal, a speech and language therapist, won the Respect award for her work developing material for Eastern European and Asian clients. On winning her award, she said: “It is absolutely amazing, I am really, really delighted.”

The winner in the Openness category was the Trust’s foot health specialists for developing an IT system to help them communicate more effectively across their 40 different work locations.

The Working Together award went to a team who identify children and young people attending accident and emergency who are not registered with a GP or a school.

Improvement was won by the Human Resources Service Desk for setting up an IT system to support staff queries.

The housekeeping team at the Airedale Centre for Mental Health won the Excellence award for their improving of the service users’ environment.

The awards, in their ninth year, are sponsored by Bradford-based Sovereign Health Care.

The Winners:

RESPECT: Louise McChrystal, consultant speech and language therapist, multi-lingual communities.

Louise has made sure that Eastern European children and their families get the same quality of speech and language service as more established communities in the Bradford area.

She has improved access to information by listening to the needs of local communities.

She has designed new information leaflets in Czech and Slovak and has designed communications tools and resources for the speech and language team to use in clinics.

These tools have been developed in people’s first and home language.

Laura Phillips, a speech and language therapist, said: “Louise is a real inspiration.

“She speaks Punjab, Urdu and is learning Czech and Slovak. When I use the resources Louise has developed in clinic it’s amazing to see the reaction on families’ faces.”

OPENNESS: Podiatry - ‘Knowing How We Are Doing’.

Members of the podiatry team are based at more than 40 different clinical sites across Bradford and Airedale. They very rarely come together due to their geographical spread.

To make sure staff are engaged in the service, and feel encouraged to have their say, a virtual discussion board has been created. This can be accessed by all staff electronically regardless of where they are working. This board is called ‘Knowing How We Are Doing’.

Joanna Hammond, a specialist podiatrist, said: “The board has made us much more open as a department. The communication tool has given us increased confidence in the way we provide the best possible care to the people who use our services.”

IMPROVEMENT: Human Resources (HR) Service Desk.

The team has developed a single point of access for the Bradford District Care Trust’s 3,000 members of staff. The 24-hour service allows staff to contact the Service Desk by email or phone with any work-related query and receive the best possible advice or support.

The small team operating the HR Service Desk has dealt with 8,000 queries in the last two years. Claire Hannon, HR operations manager, said: “It’s a smarter way of working. The Service Desk frees up time for managers and clinicians to continue their important work with service users whilst we provide a solution to their queries.”

WORKING TOGETHER: Clinical Leads School Nursing with Accident and Emergency Liaison Nurse.

An average of ten children and young people attend accident and emergency at the Bradford Royal Infirmary per week who are either not in education or registered with a GP.

A team, led by the Bradford District Care Trust’s Children and Family Services, has developed a robust system to identify these children and young people. It involves primary care, secondary care and local education providers. Together they ensure that health and education needs are met and most importantly, any safeguarding issues are addressed.

Gail Opio-te, a school nurse, said: “Children move in and out of Bradford all the time. The ones that are the most vulnerable are the ones that are not known to services. Everyone involved has gone out of their way to make sure that these children are identified and kept safe.”

In some cases families move out of the area before they have been allocated a school or GP practice.With this project in place there is now a record of the child being in Bradford.

EXCELLENCE: Airedale Centre Mental Health Housekeeping Team.

The housekeeping team at the Airedale Centre for Mental Health (ACMH) is responsible for the cleanliness of the hospital and providing meals-on-wards for service users.

They clean all areas, including clinical and waiting areas, and work closely with clinical staff to maintain excellent standards at the centre.

Alongside their daily duties, the team support service users during their stay with the little things that are so important, including making time to talk, listening, and providing a cheerful service.

Sue Gunning, housekeeping assistant, said: “I was really surprised and touched when one lady wrote a poem about me. It was all about what I do on the ward. It was called She Smiles.”

The Trust is a training centre for the Cleaning Operators Proficiency Scheme. Housekeeping staff at ACMH are trained to meet the standards of the nationally-recognised British Institute of Cleaning Science organisation.