hopeful note at the board’s STABILITY AND CONFIDENCE...Edwyn Collins’ recovery from a stroke was shown at an event held by NHS Highland and Chest Heart and Stroke Scot-land (CHSS)

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OCTOBER 2nd 2015

Highlights

A YEAR OF

NHS HIGHLAND is in a strong position despite facing a number of out-standing concerns, the health board’s annual review heard last month.

Board chair Garry Coutts said that 2013/14 had been a “tough year” for the board and he de-scribed 2014/15 as a year of improvements to systems and out-

comes. The next year, he said, could be characterised as one of “stability and confidence”, reflecting the strong position he said the board was now in.

Mr Coutts told the review of a range of issues facing the board, including cost pressures, medical staff recruitment and retention, changing

STABILITY AND CONFIDENCE

Chair strikes hopeful note at the board’s annual review

WALK THIS WAY: NHS Highland staff are being urged to get active on the new Inverness Campus. See page 8. Continued on page 2

How to join

the national

conversation

on health and

social care

SEE PAGE 11

Highlands

tribute to

heroine

nurse

Edith Cavell

SEE PAGE 24

- 2 -

NHS Highland’s annual review

retention, changing demograph-ics and embedding the integra-tion of health and adult social care, but insisted: “These are not challenges – it’s just the environ-ment in which we operate.”

The real challenge, he said, was operating more effectively in that environment.

The performance of all NHS boards is reviewed by the Scot-tish Government at annual re-views, which provide an opportu-nity for boards to highlight their achievements and discuss issues with the Cabinet Secretary and members of the public.

This year, NHS Highland asked Cabinet Secretary Shona Robison to consider holding it in Wick, both to ensure that these events are spread throughout the board’s area (last year’s review was held in Fort William and one before that in Inverness) and in recognition of the particular chal-lenges the board faced in deliver-ing services in Caithness.

While in Wick, Ms Robison met members of the Caithness and Sutherland Regeneration

Partnership, and attended meet-ings of the Area Clinical Forum, which advises the board on clini-cal matters, and the Area Part-nership Forum, which provides staff with an opportunity to influ-ence the board’s work. She also met patient representatives, briefly visited Caithness General Hospital and, after the review, met the NHS Highland board.

The review itself, held in the Assembly Rooms, featured a presentation by Mr Coutts and a question-and-answer session in which he, the Cabinet Secretary and the board’s chief executive, Elaine Mead, responded to en-

quiries from members of the pub-lic.

In his presentation, Mr Coutts explained the Highland Quality Approach, the management sys-tem employed by NHS Highland to deliver better health, better care and better value, and out-lined some of the benefits this was delivering to patients and service users.

The question-and-answer ses-sion was dominated by Caithness-related matters, and covered problems with medical staff re-cruitment and retention, and the ongoing redesign of services in the area.

Mr Coutts said: “Some of the questions we were asked were certainly challenging, and I wel-come that. We are absolutely committed to Caithness General Hospital and to delivering high-quality services in Caithness, but we need the support of the com-munity if we are to continue to develop and improve. The ques-tions asked reflect the very real interest there is in the community in health and social care ser-vices, and we would wish to har-ness that interest going forward.”

Continued from front page

Highland Quality Awards: Page 13

‘Inspirational film’ screening raises awareness of stroke THE incredible story of lyricist Edwyn Collins’ recovery from a stroke was shown at an event held by NHS Highland and Chest Heart and Stroke Scot-land (CHSS) in Eden Court, In-verness, last month.

A viewing of the film ‘The Pos-sibilities are Endless’ provided an opportunity to raise awareness of stroke and allow those attending to network.

Sandra Hewitt, NHS High-land’s clinical lead speech and language therapist for stroke ser-

vices, said: “This is an inspira-tional film showing one man’s personal journey and I think it will have a profound effect on stroke survivors in Highland and across the UK and beyond.

“Stroke is a lifelong condition but you can improve with time. We work alongside service users and their families to enhance their communication and support them to grow in confidence as they start communicating again.”

Gillian Currie, stroke education facilitator at CHSS, said: “At

Chest Heart & Stroke Scotland we provide a range of services to support people after stroke that have a loss of communication due to aphasia. We understand the tremendous impact that it has on the individual and their fami-lies.

“The film ‘The Possibilities are Endless’ shares with us how life after stroke and communication loss impacted on Edwyn and his partner Grace Maxwell. Many people after stroke will identify and find comfort in their story.”

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Colleagues’ farewell to

director of operations THE director of operations for NHS Highland’s former south and mid operational unit, Nigel Small, has left NHS Highland to take up a chief operating officer post in Staffordshire and Stoke on Trent Partnership NHS Trust.

And friends and colleagues of Nigel gathered last month to say goodbye to him and to present him with a “spectacular” wooden sculp-ture and a voucher.

Speaking for the team Nigel had led for 11 years, south area man-ager Jean Pierre Sieczkarek told the gathering of the tremendous sup-port, compassion, tolerance and re-spect Nigel had given to everyone

As a leader Nigel inspired total loyalty trust and confidence: “a leg-acy we will protect and maintain on his behalf”.

Jean Pierre reminded everyone of Nigel’s love of Sunderland AFC, with a cake baked by Aileen Birch, Nigel’s PA, decorated with the foot-ball club’s motto, “In Pursuit of Ex-cellence” – a motto he may well have modelled his team on.

Nigel expressed his thanks to his team, and his admiration of their support and excellence. He talked about his love of the Highlands, the pleasure his job had given him and the friendship and support he re-ceived from his team and wider col-leagues.

Friends and colleagues gather for Nigel’s farewell bash

Nigel with the sculpture he was given as a farewell gift

A cake featuring the motto of Nigel’s favourite football team, Sunderland

- 4 -

NHS HIGHLAND has appointed a principal officer for health inequalities, equality and diver-sity.

And, despite having only been in post for just a short time, Helen Sikora has a clear vision of how the service will develop over the next few years.

“My vision is to promote un-derstanding of equality and health inequalities issues throughout NHS Highland,” she said. “I want to equip staff with this knowledge and how we might respond to these issues. I am developing some training ses-sions for staff which I plan to roll-out shortly.

“The aim is for us to have a fair NHS in Highland, where eve-ryone can access and benefit from our services regardless of race, gender, disability, other characteristics or circumstances. This is part and parcel of what we should be doing as a public-sector organisation, and it is eve-ryone’s responsibility.”

Mrs Sikora arrived in Highland from York, where she had consid-erable experience in developing

strategies and policies in the pub-lic sector. She worked for the NHS Vale of York Clinical Com-missioning Group as the strategy and assurance manager – a role which included responsibility for health inequalities and equalities.

Mrs Sikora, who also served as an intelligence analyst in the Royal Air Force, said: “The key thing that I will be looking at is how we embed awareness and understanding of equalities and health inequalities in our plan-ning, policies and practice.”

Mrs Sikora has recently re-freshed guidance about the inter-pretation support that NHS High-

land provides for its patients if they do not speak English or if they require communication sup-port; e.g. British Sign Language.

The guidance has been up-dated to reflect current legisla-tion, contact details and has been made more concise so staff can easily understand when and how to use interpretation services. This guidance is available on the NHS Highland intranet site in the Policies Library.

For further information on health inequalities, equalities and diversity, you can contact Helen on 01463 704730 or at [email protected]

Working

towards a

fairer NHS

Helen Sikora, who has been

appointed principal offi-cer for health inequalities, equality and

diversity

COMMUNITY Planning Partners (CPP) in Highland have agreed unanimously to support the recruit-ment of retained firefighters.

Although recruitment is open periodically and is specifically targeted to those parts of the Highlands that are most in need anyone interested in becom-

ing a retained firefighter can speak to someone at their local fire station or visit https://www.myjobscotland.gov.uk/emergency-services/scottish-fire-and-rescue-service/jobs to find out when the recruitment process opens once again.

Support for drive to recruit more retained firefighters in Highland

- 5 -

THE woman who heads the public health team in Argyll and Bute Health and Social Care Partnership has been or-dained as a deacon in the Scot-tish Episcopal Church.

The ordination of Elaine Garman was carried out by the Rt Rev Kevin Pearson, Bishop of Argyll and The Isles, in St John’s Cathedral, Oban.

Those attending the ordination included visiting clergy as well as the congregation of Oban wor-shippers, members from churches in which Elaine will serve, family, friends and work colleagues.

Elaine was presented to the bishop for ordination by friends who had taken a significant role in her journey to this new minis-try, one of whom was her work colleague, nurse consultant Patricia Renfrew.

The Rev Elaine Garman will serve as curate in St Paul’s Rothesay and Holy Trinity Dunoon. Her new role will see

her carrying out pastoral duties and leading worship in Rothesay and Dunoon churches as she continues into the next phase of the ministerial training, with the guidance of Dean Andrew Swift, the rector of the churches.

She will continue her full-time job in public health.

Elaine trained for the ministry in the Scottish Episcopal Institute, the Scottish Episcopal Church’s theological college.

The training, carried out over several years, was a mix of dis-tance learning with Aberdeen University, residential periods and placements in various churches.

Ordination as a deacon is the first stage of ordained ministry in the Episcopal Church and other Anglican churches. Some people may then remain as a deacon, with a ministry focused on service both in church services and in the community. Others are ordained priests, usually about a year after being ordained deacon.

Elaine becomes a deacon

Islanders quizzed

on patient travel

HIGH on the agenda for the Islay and Jura Services Review Group, especially since the new Patient Travel Policy was introduced, is the transport of patients both within Islay and from the island to the mainland.

A survey on patients’ travel for residents on Islay and Jura is cur-rently under way and forms can be found at venues around the islands, including at Islay Hospi-tal, in GP surgeries and in the Third Sector Interface Office in Bowmore. Responses to the sur-vey should be returned to Alison Guest, Islay Hospital, by mid-October.

The review group has been told that Marcin Padarowki, Is-lay’s recently appointed dental practitioner, was now settled into his new role in the dental unit at the hospital and there had al-ready been positive feedback about the service from the com-munity.

The outstanding part-time den-tal practitioner vacancy currently remained unfilled, the review group heard.

The process for appointing the integrated posts of Mid Argyll, Kintyre and Islay locality manager and the local area manager for Islay and Jura had now been agreed and it was anticipated that the date for completion of the process would be close to the original planned timescale of the end of September.

- 6 -

Continued on next page

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Continued from previous page

- 8 -

NHS HIGHLAND staff are being urged to make use of the net-work of paths and cycleways on the new Inverness Campus.

With more than 30 acres of parkland, the campus was de-signed as a facility for everybody: a gathering place in which people can enjoy their leisure time.

And the occupational health physiotherapists behind NHS Highland’s ‘Beware of the Chair’ initiative, which encourages em-ployees to be less sedentary dur-ing their working hours, say it’s a great resource for staff to use in their spare time.

“It would great to see our em-ployees in Inverness nipping across to the campus for a run or a walk at lunchtime,” said Lesley Marshall. “Along with my col-league Michelle Smith I recently checked out the campus and im-mediately saw its potential for leisure use by NHS Highland staff.

“Highlands and Islands Enter-prise, which owns the campus, is keen to encourage more people to use it, and I’d urge our staff to do so. In our ‘Beware of the Chair’ campaign we point out that inactivity is the fourth biggest kil-ler in Britain. Too many of us live sedentary lives and going for a

walk, a jog or a cycle at the cam-pus, either before or after work or during lunchtime, would get us moving, fitter and healthier.”

The Inverness Campus site is well connected to the adjacent Life Science district with the dis-tinctive ‘golden bridge’ over the A9 offering a direct route for those on foot or cycling from the campus to Raigmore Hospital, the Centre for Health Science,

Assynt House and LifeScan Scot-land, as well as a connection to Inverness city centre. The ‘Beware of The Chair’

campaign has been adopted by NHS Highland as one of the three priorities in the board’s health and wellbeing strategy for staff. Rise to the challenge: See

next page. Photographs courtesy of Highlands and Is-

lands Enterprise.

Map copyright Tristram Woolston

NHS Highland staff urged

to get active on campus

- 9 -

OVER the past year we have been campaigning to raise awareness about the negative health risks attached to seden-tary behaviour. Increasing numbers of NHS Highland staff are aware of these risks and are making positive changes on how to become more active at work.

However, there are certain areas that have been slow to change.

During our occupational health physiotherapy consultations staff are frequently complaining about the amount of time spent sitting at meetings. Many find this un-

comfortable and tiring. Feedback from staff who are endorsing standing meetings is that they are less sore and the meeting times are now much shorter and more efficient. A standing meeting ex-periment found that meeting times were reduced by 25 per cent!

So, during October we would like to all NHS staff regularly in-volved in meetings to ‘Rise to the Challenge’.

Here are some ideas: Try to stand for all or part of

a short meeting Stand for every third agenda

item (written into the agenda) and

invite attendees to continue standing thereafter if they wish. Break meetings every 20-30

minutes to allow for activity/movement If there are small numbers,

try a walking meeting. There have proved very popular with staff and with the lovely new UHI in Inverness there really is no ex-cuse for staff based near the campus.

So, give it a go. It would be great to receive feedback so please get in touch.

Lesley Marshall and Michelle Smith, occupa-

tional health physiotherapists

Rise to the Challenge!

‘BEING Dementia Smart (BDS) is an innovative dementia curricu-lum integrated within the pre-registration nursing programme since 2014 across all three cam-puses at the School of Health Sciences, University of Stirling.

The curriculum development group was led by Dr Leah Maca-den, lecturer on the Highland campus, in collaboration with Ruth Mantle, the Alzheimer Scot-land dementia nurse consultant for NHS Highland.

This programme has been

shortlisted as a finalist under the ‘best educational initiative’ cate-gory in Scotland’s Dementia Awards 2015.

The distinctive features of this educational initiative are that it integrates the ‘Standards of Care for Dementia in Scotland’, the Promoting Excellence Frame-work, is delivered using a multi-

agency approach and is under-pinned by the National Dementia Strategy.

BDS is a proactive response to the National Action Plan for Dementia in Scotland that will contribute to the development of the nursing workforce against the Promoting Excellence Knowl-edge and Skills Framework.

Educational initiative is

shortlisted in Scotland’s Dementia Awards

- 10 -

C HRON’S and Colitis UK (CCUK) Highlands and Is-

lands Group have donated money to the IBD team at Raig-more Hospital allowing them to buy a new set of weighing scales.

The scales will be used to im-prove patient care from a dietetic and nursing perspective and will allow specialist IBD dietician Lisa Macleman to monitor patients more thoroughly and highlight any patients with IBD who may need her care.

Lisa said: “The scales will al-

low for a more accurate nutri-tional assessment for our pa-tients. Having electronic weight and height readings will allow us to highlight any at-risk patients who can then be referred.”

IBD clinical nurse specialist Mhairi Fraser added: “We are incredibly grateful for this dona-tion from the group; they have always been supportive of us. The scales will absolutely be put to good use and we can’t thank them enough for this kind dona-tion.”

Mhairi Fraser (left) and Lisa Macleman (right) accept the donation from Susan Maniquiz from CCUK Highlands and Islands Group

Gift funds new scales for team Applications being sought for abstracts

for NHS Highland’s

annual R&D conference

THE call has gone out for ab-stract applications for the forth-coming annual NHS Highland Research, Development & Inno-vation conference which will take place at the Centre for Health Science, Inverness, on Friday 13th November.

This event will include keynote speakers, break-out sessions, posters, lunch, project and busi-ness stands, and networking op-portunities. It promises to be an informative day to highlight re-search, development and innova-tion activities in NHS Highland.

Anyone who is interested in attending, submitting a poster or presenting their work at one of the break-out sessions should contact [email protected] or com-plete the relevant application forms which can be found on the NHS Highland intranet under the heading Staff > Research and De-velopment.

The closing date for applica-tions is Friday 9th October.

Staff fund-raiser

STAFF in NHS Highland’s patient booking service have raised £256 for Macmillan by selling cakes and bakes for a week in their de-partment.

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THE Scottish Government has launched what it calls a “national conversation” about health and so-cial care services.

To help get the conversation started, the govern-ment has developed three broad questions: What support is needed to lead healthier lives? What areas of health and social care matter most to you? Thinking about the future of health and social care services, where should the Scottish Govern-ment’s focus be?

The conversation, which will run until April next year, will explore what health and social care ser-vices should look like 10-15 years from now.

The government wants to know what it is that often stops people from eating healthily, exercising,

giving up smoking, or drinking less. It wants to talk about how healthcare treatment

can be more easily accessed, whether in hospital, in our communities or at home.

It wants to talk about how social care is ac-cessed.

And it wants to discuss how a greater range of services can be provided for people in local centres and what these services should look like, as well as how some specialist care could be best delivered in centres of excellence.

More information on the national conversation is available on the website www.healthier.scot

To complete a local Survey Monkey question-naire go to https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/HealthierScotland

STAFF and volunteers at a re-cently re-opened care home in Mallaig have served up a very special treat to residents and locals.

The Mackintosh Centre re-cently laid on a slap-up evening dinner, giving residents and guests the opportunity to dress up and enjoy some fine dining.

The event was sold out, with 25 bookings having been taken.

Jackie Hodges, the home’s interim manager, said: “This was all part of a programme of com-munity engagement events at the centre.

“Since NHS Highland re-opened the centre on 3rd August, having been closed for almost a year, we have had a fantastic re-sponse from the local community.

“It was standing room only at an excellent open afternoon we held recently, when family and friends of residents, along with

others from the local community, turned out in force to see the cen-tre and meet staff. Entertainment was provided by a ceilidh band from Mallaig High School and a member of staff who played the accordion.

“The temporary closure of the home pending ongoing internal investigations was obviously a trying time for all involved and it’s great to see that the five resi-dents who were relocated to In-vernevis House care home in Fort William are now happy to be back at the Mackintosh Centre.”

She added: “Everything we do there is for them, and it was the residents themselves who came up with the dinner idea. They told us that one of the things they missed about living in a care home was dressing up and going out for dinner, so we thought we’d turn our dining room into a posh restaurant for the evening,

and lay on something a bit spe-cial for residents and invited guests from the local community.

“Waiters were kitted out in for-mal dress and everyone met in the lounge for sherry and nibbles before dinner was served.”

Jackie had been working as interim manager at the centre since mid-July, but earlier this month returned to her role as NHS Highland service improve-ment lead for residential care. She handed over the reins to a new interim manager, Nancy Campbell, who has started a six-month secondment from her role as a public health practitioner in Lochaber.

Jackie said: “It really does feel like the centre is starting afresh. We improved the level of staffing, training and future planning be-fore the home re-opened and our staff have been working above and beyond the call of duty.”

Join national conversation on health and social care

Re-opened care home

serves up a tasty treat

- 12 -

THE cardio physiology department at Raigmore has received an award from Medtronic in recognition of their use of the Carelink system.

The department provides a Highland-wide service, including the Western Isles, looking after patients with implant-able devices (pacemakers, ICDs and monitoring devices).

Technology has allowed them to fol-low up some of these patients remotely from their own home; it can alert them to any problems and also saves the pa-

tient a lot of travel time. The award from Medtronic is to rec-

ognise that they have over 100 patients with the Carelink system in their home and over the last six years have re-ceived 1,382 transmissions.

Principal cardiac physiologist Fiona Dawson said: “We are very proud to have been presented this award as rec-ognition of the service we provide to our patients.”

Senior cardiac physiologist Claudia Graune is pictured with the award.

Football club helps to tackle mental health

ROSS County FC is becoming a centre for tackling mental health stigma in the Highlands, after working with the NHS on an inno-vative new project.

Over the past year NHS High-land has been working on a num-ber of new ways to change the way mental health is viewed.

One project, devised by the Mid Ross community mental health team, started with informa-tion on mental health stigma be-ing handed out at a Ross County v Celtic match last season.

Since then the group has been working with the football club’s charitable foundation to make it a centre for community work.

A room in the club’s Victoria Park stadium is now being trans-formed into a place for community groups to work in and there are plans for the players to record anti-stigma messages which can be played in the room.

During the project the commu-nity mental health team have trained anti-stigma volunteers, who will speak about mental health to local groups and em-ployers.

Team receives award for Carelink work

- 13 -

CARE HOME TEAMS

NHS HIGHLAND’S annual review, held in Wick last month, saw pres-entation of two Highland Quality Awards, which are given monthly to members of staff or teams of staff who have gone above and beyond the call of duty in their work.

The Cabinet Secretary for Health, Wellbeing and Sport, Shona Robison, presented a Highland Quality Award to senior social care workers Liz Sin-clair, who accepted it on behalf of Pulteney House care home in Wick, and Donalda Cook, who accepted it on behalf of Bayview care home, Thurso.

The Pulteney House team was nominated for the award by Jackie Hodges, service improvement lead for residential care in recognition of a particular episode of care involving a long-term resident of the home and his family.

Staff provided support as neces-sary to all, facilitating complete family involvement in the person’s care, even at such a difficult and stressful time.

The family had written to staff ex-pressing their thanks and relief at be-ing able to be part of the end-of-life care.

This was felt by the judging panel to be an award for the whole team, which recognised best practice in pal-liative/end-of-life care with a strong emphasis on ensuring a person-

centred, relationship-based ap-proach.

The Bayview team was nominated by the home’s manager, Claire McIntosh, on behalf of a resident, Willie Mackay.

This award was felt by the judging panel to show the level of care and support which allowed Mr Mackay to return to his own home. The original intention had been for Mr Mackay to be placed in another care home.

An unusual aspect of this case was that Mr Mackay had written a poem about his care which captured with some humour what he felt at the time.

AND BEYOND! WENT ABOVE

Do you know a possible quality award winner?

NOMINATIONS for the Highland Quality Award can be submitted by staff, patients, carers and the wider public for an individual or team employed by NHS High-land, or working as part of the wider NHS.

The award reflects on an individual or team who has demonstrated actions and behaviours which epitomise every-thing about the High-land Quality Approach.

Nominations should be made to: Highland Quality Awards, NHS H i g h l a n d , As s y n t House, Beechwood Park, Inverness, IV2 3BW, or by e-mail to n h s h i g h l a n d [email protected]

The Cabinet Secretary presents Highland Quality Awards to Liz Sin-clair and Donalda Cook, with NHS Highland chair Garry Coutts look-ing on

- 14 -

THE senior charge nurse role at Lawson Memorial Hospital in Golspie has been filled follow-ing the retiral of the Allison Mackay – and it’s being shared by two people.

Joanne Gemmill and Ashley Ross have taken over the post on a job-share basis, Ashley working Mondays-Wednesdays and Joanne Wednesdays-Fridays.

Lorraine Coe, NHS Highland’s district manager for Sutherland, said that having the post shared was “a perfect solution to filling an important and often demanding role”, and added: “Joanne and Ashley are both experi-enced nurses with quite different backgrounds, though they both share a passion for developing healthcare provision in hospitals such as the Lawson.

“They have been in post for only a short time but their respective skills and experience are al-ready proving a real as-set.”

Joanne is from Ardgay, where she now lives, and did her nurse training in Glasgow before going to work in the A&E department in the city’s Southern General Hospital.

Before taking up her new post she spent five years travelling the world as lead nurse in various cruise ships – work she believes to be closely related to her cur-rent job.

She explained: “People tend to think that all a nurse on a cruise

ship deals with is patients with motion sickness but it’s not like that at all. A ship’s hospital can cater for a population of 4,000 patients and crew, and their healthcare needs are as diverse as those you would see in any hospital on land.

“In many ways, it was very much like working in a rural hos-pital setting, dealing with a wide range of problems, from trips and falls to intensive care. It was chal-lenging – just like working in the Lawson.”

Joanne added that she knew the hospital from childhood – “It’s where I was sent as a young girl if I needed treatment” – and was impressed with the changes made to the site in recent years.

“It’s a very dynamic place,” she said, “and I am looking for-ward to seeing the development of the old Cambusavie Unit over the next few years.”

Ashley, who is from Dornoch,

has been at the Lawson Memo-rial Hospital throughout her nurs-ing career. She did her nurse training in Inverness and qualified in 2001, when she went to work at the Lawson on a part-time ba-sis.

She has worked in a range of roles at the hospital and says she is able to tap on that wide range of experience in her new role.

“There is certainly a lot to the job,” she said. “Our role is multi-faceted, engaging and communi-cating with the integrated care

team regularly to ensure that strong links are main-tained between the commu-nity and the hospital. “As a team, Joanne and I are committed to support-ing the staff in the Lawson Memorial Hospital to en-sure the high standards of care to our patients and relatives that the Lawson has always provided.” The person the new senior charge nurses is re-placing, Allison Mackay, recently retired after 25 years at the Lawson – but she’s retained her ties with the hospital.

She now works there occa-sionally as a “bank” nurse, pro-viding staff cover when it’s needed.

Lorraine Coe said: “It’s great that we are still able to tap on Alli-son’s tremendous experience as a nurse. She was very much part-and-parcel of the hospital for many years and we wish her well as her life moves into a new phase.”

Sharing key hospital role

seen as ‘perfect solution’

Ashley Ross (left) and Joanne Gemmill

- 15 -

Couple makes ‘grand’

diamond gesture

A DIAMOND wedding anniver-sary has given a welcome boost to the children’s ward at Raigmore Hospital.

Ken and Peggy Watson, from Easter Kinkell, recently cele-brated 60 years of marriage but instead of gifts they asked for do-nations for the ward and have now been able to donate £1000.

Mr Watson said: “We had about 40 family and friends at a party to celebrate our anniversary and were delighted that we have been able to donate £1000 to the ward as a result of that.

“We’ve donated before after our golden wedding anniversary but since then our great grandson

Harris has been a patient in the ward when he had meningitis at the age of one. We’re both de-lighted that we’re able to say thank you for the care he re-ceived in this way.”

Stephanie Mackenzie, senior play specialist for NHS Highland, said: “This is a very kind gesture from the Watson family and I really can’t thank them enough for the donation to the ward. It shall be put to good use within the department.”

THE charity Men’s Health Highland is looking for new members and is asking anyone interested to attend their upcoming annual general meeting to meet current members and find out more about what the charity does.

The charity, which uses a programme of activi-ties throughout the year to help improve the health of people in the Highlands, holds its AGM at 2.30pm today (2nd October) at Inshes Church, In-verness.

Robin Stewart, from Men’s Health Highland, ex-plained that members got involved in a wide range of activities.

He said: “Activities are held throughout the year

including public talks from health professionals and we have organised conferences and have carried out research projects.

“We have also published or presented at medical meetings on the state of men's health in the High-lands as well men’s readiness to seek advice and treatment and we frequently have public stands that offer blood pressure checks, height and weight measurements as well as advice to members of the public.

“I hope those interested are able to come along on the day but for those who are unable to make the meeting I’m more than happy for them to get in touch and find out more.”

Highland charity launches appeal for more members

Pictured above, from left, are Kir-sty Watson, Stephanie Mackenzie, Harris Watson, Peggy Watson and Ken Watson

Stephanie Mackenzie, senior play specialist for NHS Highland, pic-tured above with two-year-old Har-ris Watson

- 16 -

STAFF in the cardiac unit at Raig-more Hospital have received a do-nation of over £2,000 from the Heartbeat Challenge which has allowed them to buy equipment for the department.

Using the donation the depart-ment has bought monitoring equip-ment that can be used in hospital and in GP surgeries to help diagnose people who have palpitations. A total of six monitors have been bought.

Patients are able to wear these monitors at home and, when they experience symptoms, press a but-ton on the monitor which then re-cords the data. This can then be sent to the hospital down the phone line.

Professor Stephen Leslie, consult-ant cardiologist for NHS Highland, said: “The majority of people who have palpitations do not need to come to hospital and the purchase of this equipment means that more people can be treated closer to home which is particularly useful for pa-tients who live in remote and rural areas.

“We are very grateful to the Heart-beat Challenge for this donation and are working closely with our col-leagues in primary care to make sure it is put to the best possible use for our patients.”

RIGHT: Professor

Stephen Leslie, con-sultant car-

diologist; Glen Had-

dow, of Heartbeat

Challenge; Fiona Daw-

son, prinici-pal cardiac

physiolo-gist, holding

one of the monitors

(also below right)

Cash boost

for unit

- 17 -

A DONATION to the cardiac unit has lead to improve-

ments to the quiet room in the cath lab at Raigmore Hospital.

Mrs Ishbel Clarkson, from Brora, made the donation in memory of her husband John and asked that it be used to benefit both patients and staff.

Professor Steve Leslie, con-sultant cardiologist for NHS High-land, explained that the quiet room was designed as area for families and/or friends to wait news of their sick relative.

He said: “When patients are admitted as an emergency they will often come directly to the cath lab.

“Quite often relatives and/or friends may come with them and we have this area set aside where they can wait, in private, for news on their loved one. The room is also used to discuss X-ray procedures with patients.

“However, what we noticed was that the room was quite ba-sic and it was agreed that we use the donation to improve this space.”

New furniture was bought for the room but Professor Leslie also approached the charity In-verness Men’s Shed to see if they could help brighten up the room and he is delighted with the result.

He said: “The skills they have as a group are perfect for a pro-ject like this. They were very happy to be approached to help

brighten the room up and have provided us with photographs and paintings.

“This is an excellent example of the community type work and service that Men's Shed can pro-vide and the department as a whole is very happy with the end result.”

Robbie Smart, from Inverness Men’s Shed, explained that the group was pleased to assist with the project.

He said: “The Men's Shed in Inverness was the first in the Highlands & Islands and opened

for business almost two years ago. We have about 70 members many of whom attend the Shed throughout the week.

“We have a very strong wood-working group and also, among others, an enthusiastic photogra-phy and watercolour group.”

Mr Smart, who is retired from Northern Constabulary, explained that he, along with two other members of the group provided the pictures.

He said: “Colin Bain is retired from the force like me and Allan Beattie is a retired head Techni-cal teacher with Inverness Royal Academy.

“I’d also like to mention Dave Norwood, a retired manager from Dalcross Airport who did a lot to assist us with the overall work.

“As a group our motivation is to help others as well as our-selves by making and repairing things within our local community and we were more than happy to help with the quiet room.”

Pictured from left are Mrs Ishbel Clarkson, Dave Norwood, Allan Beattie, staff nurse Karen Hercher, Professor Steve Leslie (back row), Colin Bain and Robbie Smart

Some of the artwork in the room

Quiet

room gets

new look

- 18 -

T HE Special Care Baby Unit

(SCBU) at Raig-more Hospital has received £12,000 from a little girl who wanted to say thank-you for the care she received there.

Amelia Jo Kelly, from Inverness, was eight weeks prema-ture when she was born on 16th Sep-tember last year and spent four weeks in SCBU.

Amelia’s mum, Kelly, explained that they wanted to give something back to the unit for the care she received and they were delighted that they could do-nate such a large amount on Amelia’s first birthday.

She said: “Our initial goal was to raise £1,000 and I can’t believe that we’re able to hand over a cheque for 12 times that!”

Kelly explained that a number of fundraising events were held over eight weeks to raise money for the unit, includ-ing a fun day, money collection at a recent Ross County match and a balloon release which represented all the babies who had been treated in SCBU.

These events raised £7,348 and Kelly’s friends Tony Vas-tano and Graham McPherson donated £5292 which they raised by doing a sponsored cycle, taking the grand total to £12,640.

Kelly said: “It’s a lovely ges-ture from Tony and Graham. I’m incredibly grateful for their sup-port and the support we’ve had from everyone during the fund-raising campaign.

“It seems fitting that Amelia got to present the unit with the cheque on her first birthday. I’m just so pleased we have been able to do this.”

Senior charge nurse Alison Maclean accepted the cheque on behalf of the unit.

She said: “It was such a pleasure to see Amelia again. Many of the staff remember her from when she was a patient, and we couldn’t wait to wish her a happy birthday!

“We’re so grateful for this very generous donation and would really like to thank the Kelly family and everyone else who put in so much time and effort to raise this amazing amount. It will certainly be put to good use within the unit.”

Pictured from left are staff midwife Sheilagh Grace, Chris Kelly, Kelly Macrae, staff midwife Sharon Lawrence and, in the foreground, Amelia Jo Kelly

£12,000 thanks for baby unit

from birthday girl Amelia Jo

- 19 -

PEOPLE attending or passing by Gairloch Health Centre this month were able to learn more about Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD) as part of FASD Awareness Day, which is held on the ninth day of the ninth month each year.

This year the awareness day encouraged people to have breakFASD, which not only al-lowed people to come in for a bite to eat but they also got to learn more about FASD from the staff present.

Community midwife Rona McCall held the event in Gairloch to raise awareness within the wider community about support-ing women to avoid alcohol when pregnant or trying to conceive.

She said: “I offered a continen-tal style breakfast to those wait-ing to be seen by the nurse or GP, and any passerby who

wanted to pop in. “Those coming in did engage

with FASD and asked what it was about with some taking the litera-ture away with them. It also sparked some discussion with a few of the attendees about other health messages: not smoking and the value of breast feeding.

“My community nursing col-leagues who helped me to set it all up were also interested in the message.”

Alcohol and pregnancy

If you are pregnant or planning to be pregnant you should avoid alcohol If you’re pregnant and you have a drink, your baby has a drink too If you didn’t know you were pregnant and have been drinking small amounts the risk is low but the best thing is to stop drinking now Drinking when pregnant increases the risk of miscar-riage and also may cause permanent life-long damage to your baby There is no known safe amount of alcohol to drink when you are pregnant There is no safe stage of your pregnancy to drink al-cohol All kinds of alcohol do the same harm Be the nominated driver if you don’t want to drink and don’t want to disclose you are pregnant If you have been drink-ing during pregnancy, espe-cially binge drinking, speak to your midwife and she can offer advice and support during and after pregnancy.

Event provides

food for thought

ARE you tired of sitting behind your desk all day? Are you looking for a way to exercise during lunchtime and meet new friends?

Then the new power walking group at the John Dewar Building in Inverness could be just what you’re looking for.

The group was started by oc-cupational therapist Rachel Hince in a bid to meet new people and get some fresh air during the working day – and she is encour-aging staff based at the office to get involved.

“I started the group as I was recently transferred to John De-war from Raigmore, and I didn’t really know anyone,” said Rachel. “It’s a great way of getting some fresh air and exercise during your working day – and I have met some wonderful people in the process.

“We have been power walking for the last three weeks and now have nine members in our group. We walk for half an hour every Tuesday and Thursday, leaving from the front door at 1pm.

“Over the last three weeks we have managed to find an excel-lent route which takes us out into the countryside and away from the traffic. It’s a great way to switch off from the office for 30 minutes and is great way of im-proving your fitness.

“Some of our members use the group to improve their health and make new friends, but there are people who are using it to help them quit smoking. We cover a two-mile route at a brisk walking pace, so if you’re inter-ested, come along and join us!”

For more information, call Ra-chel Hince on 01463 706738 or email [email protected]

Power walking

group launched

- 20 -

THE stroke unit at Raigmore Hospital and Chest Heart and Stroke Scotland (CHSS) held a joint celebration this month to launch Strokeness, a new sup-port group for stroke survi-vors, and to celebrate 10 years of the Stroke Patient and Carer Group.

As well as stalls, games and mini competitions, head and hand massage and a raffle there was music provided by the Merkinch Pipers and Tom Cruikshank and his ceilidh band.

A total of £1347 was raised and will be split between the Stroke Unit and CHSS.

Linda Campbell, stroke co-ordinator for NHS Highland, ex-plained that the patient and carer group had been involved in a number of developments that had benefited stroke patients and

their carers locally and nationally and she was pleased their contri-bution was marked in this way.

She said: “Highland Stroke Services already had a good track record of working with our patients, carers and the wider public and since implementation of the patient and carer group it has just got better.

“I’m delighted that we’re able to mark their 10 years with this joint celebration and we also couldn’t think of a better time to launch the new support group, Strokeness, which looks to sup-port and enhance the lives of stroke survivors.”

Strokeness, which is affiliated to CHSS, was set up to provide support to stroke survivors throughout the Inverness area.

Alan Reeks (61) is one of the founding members of Strokeness.

Originally from Guildford in Sur-rey he has been living in Inver-ness for the past 10 years and suffered a stroke in October 2013, remaining in Raigmore Hospital until January 2014.

He said: “I still have problems with my left hand and my left foot can go numb but I’m OK, al-though I haven’t been able to get back to work as I started having seizures this year.

“I first heard about Strokeness when I was approached by Paula Young, occupational therapist, to see if I would be interested in helping set the group up. I didn’t hesitate in saying yes; I wanted to give something back.

“The stroke staff are excellent but the support we can give is knowledge and first-hand experi-ence of what they are going through and the feelings and emotions associated with that.

“At our second meeting every-one said how good it was to be able to share their experiences with others who have been through it.

“Through social gatherings, support meetings, education and representation we want to im-prove the lives of stroke survivors who can often feel isolated by their condition. We want them to know that they are not alone.”

For more information about Strokeness or if you know some-body who would be interested in joining, call 07835 035089 or email [email protected]

Anniversary

event sees launch

of support group

Farewell to Margaret COLLEAGUES said a fond farewell last month to Margaret Featch, who had worked as a laundry assistant at Raigmore Hospital for the past 14 years. Margaret, who is pictured with assistant facilities support manager Morag Drew, is known by colleagues for her hard work and rarely missing a day at work.

- 21 -

AT a meeting of Mull and Iona Health and Care Group last month, members heard that through a training and development programme the Scottish Ambulance Service was on track to increase para-medic availability for the islands.

The meeting was also told that the GP recruit-ment process was continuing with further interviews scheduled to take place at the end of October.

Plans are also under way to purchase a 4x4 im-mediate response vehicle for use by the Doctor on

call and the vehicle will be kitted out with emer-gency medical equipment.

A medical practice newsletter will be issued shortly which will inform all patients of the new is-land-wide Practice. The new practice is also keen to develop patient participation groups across the is-land.

A staff development day had been organised for 28th September for all the staff working across the three sites.

TRAINEE project manager Ross McEwen is leaving NHS High-land to walk the halls of West-minster when he takes up a nine-month placement on the ‘Speaker’s Parliamentary Place-ment Scheme’ in October.

Ross, who has worked at Raig-more across a number of different departments since the age of 16, will be one of 10 people taking up the position out of an appli-cation list of over 500.

He explained that he had been assigned to work with front bench SNP MP Dr Philippa Whitford, member of Health Select Commit-tee and the party’s health spokesperson at Westmin-ster.

The post will involve research and information gathering regard-ing the NHS and the many differ-ent arenas of care within it on a UK level as well as a Scottish one.

General day-to-day duties will include working on press re-leases, attending meetings and committees and working towards a close-knit line of communication

between Dr Whitford’s office and the office of the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing in Holy-rood.

Ross will start two-week induc-tion training on 12th October, which will include a welcome to Parliament from the Speaker of the House of Commons, John

Bercow, and he starts work with Dr Whitford on 26th October. He said: “I will miss working with Raigmore Hospital. I started here back in 2004 collecting glasses and serving drinks in the Recreation Hall. “I then worked with portering for seven

years and my most recent position was as a member of the capital projects team under NHS High-land Estates.”

He added: “I’ve had congratu-lations and well wishes from fur-ther afield including members of the Meatloaf band, The Offspring, Bad Company, Whitesnake, Deep Purple as well as from Inverness MP Drew Hendry.

“I am really looking forward to this new challenge.”

Westminster beckons

for trainee manager

Paramedic availability to be stepped up on islands

How to work up a research

question…

A COURSE on ‘Developing a Research Question’ is to be held on 10th November from 10am-4pm in the Centre for Health Science, Inverness.

To be presented by NHS Highland consultant cardiolo-gist Professor Stephen Leslie, the course is designed to help structure an approach in de-veloping a good and effective research question, to under-stand the implications of the question for the whole of one’s research approach and to help bring a critical eye to the research question proc-ess.

The sessions will be largely interactive and will have ca-pacity to focus on partici-pants’ individual questions and areas of interest.

To apply for this study day complete and return the appli-cation form which can be found on the NHS Highland intranet under the heading Staff > Research and Develop-ment.

Those who do not have ac-cess to the intranet should email [email protected]

- 22 -

A THERAPY radiogra-pher from NHS High-land has just returned

from Kenya after spending 10 days in the area raising awareness of cancer among the local population.

Adesh Jutton (27), who is based at Raigmore Hospital, was there with a group of volun-teers with the charity Cancel Cancer Africa, which raises awareness of the early signs and symptoms of cancer.

Adesh, who heard about the opportunity via the Society of Radiographers, was one of six volunteers who spent time in Busia County, a rural area in West Kenya, encouraging peo-ple to come forward to find out more about cancer and to get checked.

He said: “The charity travels to various countries across Af-rica each year and this is the

second time Cancel Cancer Af-rica has been to Kenya raising awareness. People there tend to know very little about the dis-ease as other diseases are more prevalent but cancer is still affecting many people.

“With many cancers in the

region being diagnosed at very late stages, raising awareness on early detection and screen-ing can save many preventable deaths and remove the stigmas they have there about cancer.

Kenya trip

helps cancer

charity

Continued on next page

- 23 -

“As volunteers we are there, along with the nurses who do the screening, to encourage people to come forward and we ask them questions to get infor-mation on them and their family history.”

Adesh explained that before they started there was a big march through the city, com-plete with band, which was heavily supported by the Health Minister and the First Lady of the county which re-ceived a lot of attention and helped publicise what they were doing.

He told Highlights: “All the checks pro-vided by the charity are free which also helped a great deal in get-ting people to come along.

“Busia County has seven sub-counties and we travelled to each of the hospitals there. We saw about 2500 people this year compared to the 1000 they saw last year.

“Our focus was originally on breast cancer but the project in Kenya has grown to include cer-vical and prostate cancers. From what we saw cervical is proving to be the biggest prob-lem.”

Adesh explained that through their survey and data gathering

they would find out that many of those attending had family members who were or had been affected.

He said: “We found that there were quite a few who had symp-toms when they attended, not all of these were necessarily cancer but I think we were all just glad that they were coming along to get checked out, that way we could inform what to look out for, how to perform self-checks and encourage them to spread the word and to continue attending further screening ses-sions.

“In speaking to them as part of the information gathering you would be told so many stories about them, their family and their history.

“It was an amazing experi-ence.

“I would happily volunteer with Cancel Cancer Africa again. I’d like to go somewhere where they have not been be-fore as I think a real difference can be made in the work that they do.

"I would also encourage any-one with an interest in volun-teering or would like to know more to contact me at [email protected]."

Charitable work in Africa Continued from previous page

Asdesh Jutton pictured above at work in Raigmore and, on the left, with a patient in Kenya

- 24 -

A DEDICATION and memorial service for nurse Edith Cavell will be held next month at Cav-ell Gardens War Memorial, near Bellfield Park, Inverness.

Born in 1865 Edith had several jobs as a governess before taking up nursing following a period of nursing her father through an ill-ness. In 1905 she was put in charge of a pioneering training school for lay nurses on the out-skirts of Brussels.

In the autumn of 1914, two stranded British soldiers found their way to Edith’s training school. Others followed and were spirited away to neutral territory in Holland. An underground life-line was established, master-minded by Prince and Princess De Croy at a chateau in Mons, and some 200 soldiers were helped in their escape.

Two members of the escape team were arrested on 31 July 1915, and five days later Edith was interned. The German mili-tary authorities, having tried in secret and sentenced Edith and four others to death, were deter-mined to carry out the executions immediately.

Despite frantic efforts to save her by the American and Spanish ambassadors to Belgium, Edith

was executed by firing squad at a rifle range just outside Brussels at dawn on 12th October 1915.

The Allies acclaimed Edith as a martyr. Within eight weeks of her death, recruitment into the British Army (this was before con-scription) had doubled.

The dedication and memorial service will be held at 11am on Monday 12th October, the 100th anniversary of her death.

Highland

tribute

to heroine

nurse Edith

FROM 5th October the prefix code of the telephone number for the National Poisons Information Ser-vice (NPIS) will change from 0844 to 0344. The new telephone number for the service will therefore be 0344 892 0111.

For a transitional period callers using the previ-ous number will be reminded of the change and their enquiries will be automatically transferred to the new number free of charge.

This forwarding service will cease on 11th Janu-

ary 2016. Direct dial/switchboard settings should be up-

dated as soon as possible after 5th October and be-fore the 11th January 2016 deadline.

Users have been reminded that the National Poi-sons Information Service is not a public access ser-vice and this telephone number should not be is-sued to members of the public.

The online database of the NPIS, TOXBASE®, will continue to be available at www.toxbase.org

New number for National Poisons Information Service

- 25 -

Hospital birthday celebrations planned … for Christmas A HAPPY birthday looks set to turn into a great Christmas night out for staff at the Lorn and Islands Hospital in Oban.

It’s the hospital’s 20th

anniversary and plans are in hand to hold a celebratory dance in the Argyllshire Gathering Halls in Oban on 5

th December. The event

will feature DJ George Noble and the band Trail West.

Advanced nurse practitioner Stuart Macdonald explained that it was thought to be a good idea to have an event that all wards and departments could go to as their Christmas night out, instead of having separate nights.

Tickets cost £30 each and are available to NHS Highland staff from Diane in the finance office at Lorn and Islands Hospital between 9am-12.30pm.

H&S managers

achieve their

‘top-of-the-tree’

qualification

NHS HIGHLAND health and safety managers Amanda Glen (South and Mid, Estates) and Rosie Brunton (Raigmore) have qualified as chartered members of the Institution of Safety and Health (IOSH), the professional organisation for health and safety practitioners.

Both of them hold the NE-BOSH National Diploma in Occu-pational Safety & Health, and various other H&S qualifications, so have been graduate members, but they wanted the ‘top-of-the-tree’ qualification for practicing H&S professionals.

Amanda said: “To become chartered members we each had to complete a skills development portfolio which consisted of seven assessments to evidence our

knowledge and skills and attend-ing a peer review interview.

“We also had to prove contin-ued professional development which has to be continually main-tained in order to retain our char-tered status.”

The process took around nine

months.

Rosie said: “We were both in-terviewed during July by a panel of senior peers. Each interview consisted of delivering a 10-minute presentation followed by in-depth questions in order to demonstrate our levels of profes-sional competence; the questions had to be answered to the panel’s satisfaction and using NEBOSH terminology!

“It was a lot of work, and the pass mark is not high, so we were both relieved and delighted to receive notification advising that we had achieved chartered status.

“We now proudly use the des-ignation ‘CMIOSH’.”

Amanda Glen (left) and Rosie Brunton with their certificates

‘MAJOR trauma – a remote, rural and islands response’ will be the subject of a presentation in the Centre for Health Science, Inverness, from 12.30-2pm on 24th November. It will be given in the NES Board-room by Colville Laird, medical director, Graeme Ramage, Sandpiper Fellow, BASICS Scotland, and Arran GP Dr David Hogg.

Another presentation for the Rural GP VC Education Network will be given on 25th January from 12.30-2pm in the same venue on ‘Mental health (skills based training in suicide prevention - assessing those presenting with suicidal ideation)’, by Helen Neville, CMHT.

For more information, contact [email protected]

Spotlight on remote and rural trauma response

- 26 -

OVER the past two years, Ar-gyll and Bute Health and Social Care Partnership has seen a 70 per cent increase in the num-ber of referrals for muscular and joint injuries to the physio-therapy service in Lorn & Is-lands Hospital, Oban. Physio-therapists in the hospital are now seeing over 2,500 patients a year.

To make sure that people get

the right service and treatment at the right time and to manage the increasing demand for the ser-vice the partnership has been redesigning how the service is delivered.

This culminated early in Sep-tember with an intensive work-shop following a period of data collection and observation of the service in operation.

The workshop identified how

to make sure that: • Patients are kept well informed about their treatment options • Waiting times are reduced • There is a reduction in the num-ber of appointments wasted due to patients not attending and not letting the department know in advance

The overall self-referral proc-ess has been streamlined through the introduction of a new comprehensive referral form which includes details of NHS Inform (a national health informa-tion website) and MATS (the new non-emergency service for adults with muscle and joint problems).

Both of these provide informa-tion for patients and are an addi-tional resource that patients have the option to use.

Use of the new referral form will also enable patients be tri-aged before they attend the De-partment in order to ensure that they are directed to the most ap-propriate health professional for their needs, which may not al-ways be a physiotherapist.

The new referral form will be available online, through local GP practices and from the physio-therapy department at the hospi-tal, and patients can return it by email, post or in person.

Patients will, if they wish, be notified of their appointments through the use of a text and email system and for those peo-ple who don’t have access to these systems a postcard with their appointment details will be mailed out.

Patients will be reminded that it is important they let the depart-ment know if they are unable to make their appointment as this may allow the team to slot some-one else in at short notice.

Improvements to physio service

- 27 -

NHS HIGHLAND has been working hard to ensure that patients being admitting to hospitals with sepsis, and pa-tients in hospitals who develop sepsis, receive life-saving treatment within an hour of de-veloping sepsis.

Consultant physician Grant Franklin has been leading a group of doctors, nurses and pharmacists with the aim of re-ducing the number of people who die from sepsis in Highland.

He said: “Sepsis is one of the biggest challenges faced in healthcare and early recognition and treatment are paramount. NHS Highland has data to dem-onstrate that we have come a very long way in improving sepsis management and improving out-comes for patients in our care.”

World Sepsis Day was on September 13th, during Sepsis Awareness Month.

NHS Highland joined in with this by holding an awareness stall in Raigmore Hospital, giving out information leaflets and sepsis socks to staff, patients and rela-tives.

Staff from across Raigmore turned up to help out with raising awareness of sepsis and model-ling the sepsis socks, spreading the word that we need to ‘sock it to sepsis’.

What is sepsis?

Sepsis is a global healthcare problem. It is more common than heart attack, and claims more

lives than any cancer, yet even in the most developed countries fewer than half of the adult popu-lation have heard of it. It happens when the body’s attempt to fight an infection results in the immune system damaging tissues and organs.

What causes sepsis?

Sepsis is always triggered by an infection. Sepsis occurs as a re-sult of infections acquired both in the community and in hospitals.

The majority of cases are caused by infections we all know about: pneumonia, urinary tract infections, skin infections like cel-lulitis and infections in the abdo-men (such as appendicitis).

Invasive medical procedures like the insertion of a catheter into a blood vessel can also introduce

bacteria into the blood and trigger sepsis. Sepsis can affect all age groups and is not respectful of lifestyle choices.

What can be done

about sepsis? Cost-effective basic interventions save lives. We can double the patients’ chances of survival sim-ply by recognising the condition and responding rapidly by admin-istering appropriate antibiotics and fluids and checking blood results.

Saving lives depends not just on treatments specific to a par-ticular infection, but by focusing on early recognition and aware-ness of sepsis with rapid treat-ment. In short, sepsis is a medi-cal emergency and each hour matters.

NHS Highland

‘socks it to sepsis’

- 28 -

THE benefits of getting a good night’s sleep on your physical and mental health are often spoken about but for some an uninterrupted, good night’s sleep isn’t that easy.

Obstructive Sleep Apnoea Syndrome (OSAS) is a significant public health concern that affects four per cent of middle-aged men and two per cent of middle aged women in the UK with even more out there who are unaware that

their lack of sleep could be down to this condition and that help and support is available.

With this in mind the NHS Highland Sleep Service is plan-ning an awareness day to be held in the Raigmore Hospital canteen on 7th October to help raise awareness of this public health concern and to showcase how the new masks and devices have developed since the first sleep study 20 years ago in Ward 11.

Wendy Douglas, the sleep ser-vice sister based at Raigmore, explained that OSAS was a con-dition which caused people to stop breathing during their sleep. The upper airway closes repeat-edly resulting in brief awakenings from sleep causing disturbed, non-refreshing sleep with many debilitating symptoms experi-enced during the day.

She said: “People with sleep apnoea will often experience day-time sleepiness and report poor concentration and memory. This affects not only them but can also affect their family, friends and sometimes colleagues. Overnight the bed partner may report snor-ing, spells of breath holding or choking. Sleep can be further disturbed by the need to visit the toilet frequently overnight.

“It is a condition which can af-fect people of all ages but we do see an increase as people get older. However, we also know that for all the cases we do know about there are going to be many who have not been diagnosed.”

Wendy explained that the Highland service, which got about 500 referrals a year, not only wanted to raise awareness of the condition and hear from people who may be going untreated but to engage with those who may have previously accessed the service but who had not been in contact recently.

She said: “We are keen to tar-get those patients who have old, dusty devices unused in their lofts. They can either return the device or see how CPAP has de-veloped/be seen at clinic for re-view. I hope staff are able to en-gage with the awareness day and come along and talk to us and find out more about what we, as a service, can offer.”

Raising awareness of sleep condition

- 29 -

TWO Highland research pro-jects both centred on cystic fibrosis will be presented at the annual North American Cystic Fibrosis Conference in Phoe-nix, Arizona, this month.

Lesley Blaikie, NHS Highland cysitic fibrosis clinical nurse spe-cialist, explained that both pro-jects would be presented as post-ers at the conference which at-tracts delegates from around the world.

She said: “The first poster looks at how we can improve the safety and quality of discharge letters for cystic fibrosis (CF) pa-tients with a district general hos-pital (Raigmore).

“Over a six-month period we

did an audit of CF discharge let-ters and, using a number of dif-ferent quality improvement meth-ods, were able to improve the accuracy of both paediatric and adult discharge letters.

“Posters, teaching sessions and a hand held leaflet all played a key role in improving medicine safety and accurate discharge letters. The work we have done will be monitored to ensure we are able to maintain this.”

The second poster is a joint piece of work which Lesley was a part of evaluating the experience of parents when, following screening, their newborn receives a diagnosis of CF.

Lesley said: “Early diagnosis

and early treatment can improve outcomes but there have been reports from parents about poor experiences when being told of the diagnosis which will obviously have an impact on their adjust-ment to this news.”

Lesley explained that ano-nymised data was collected fol-lowing a survey of parents in North and South East Scotland. What was clear is that this is an important and emotive issue for CF parents but there was a lack of information on the newborn screening process.

Unsurprisingly, it was clear from the data that the more knowledge that those giving the diagnosis had on CF the more positive the response from the parents with support from the CF team consistently highly rated and in particular the role of the CF Nurse Specialist.

This study has informed the work done locally in Highland with the development of a path-way for delivering a CF diagnosis that looks to provide the best overall parent experience.

Lesley said: “Both studies have proved very worthwhile and practices have changed following the results for the benefit of all involved.

“I’m very much looking forward to presenting these at the confer-ence and looking forward to learning from others about what else we can do.”

Highland projects

to be presented

at US conference LESLEY BLAIKIE

Village Hub in baby clothes and toys plea THE Brora Village Hub is appeal-ing for donations of baby clothes and toys for children in the north of Scotland and beyond.

Engaging with Activity, a com-munity interest company working in a pilot partnership with NHS Highland, is providing activities for local people. One of many pro-jects taking place in the Hub, ‘Knit and Natter’, is dedicated to the support and comfort of babies and young children.

Service users have been busy knitting clothes and donating toys, which will be passed onto MFR’s Cash for Kids and a unique project for vulnerable children in South Africa.

Oliver’s Village is a social en-

terprise where orphaned children with HIV and Aids gain access to healthcare, education and skills development. Located in Johan-nesburg, it inspires disadvantaged children by providing a caring and stimulating environment.

MFR Cash for Kids is the char-ity arm of Moray Firth Radio, and works to raise funds for children across the north of Scotland. The Hub is keen to support MFR’s Christmas appeal for gifts, and is appealing for new items to be do-nated.

Lindsey Tennent, resource cen-tre manager for NHS Highland, is urging people to support the pro-ject. She can be contacted on 01408 622312.

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THE Professor of Sociology and co-director of the Manchester Institute for Collaborative research on ageing at the University of Manchester, James Naz-roo, was the keynote speaker at a conference on inequalities and older people in Inverness.

The event, held in Smithton Church, also fea-tured presentations from NHS Highland’s head of strategic commissioning, Simon Steer.

Professor Nazroo’s research on inequalities in later life places him as the leading UK researcher in this field and has earned him a strong international

reputation. His research on ageing has been con-cerned to understand the patterns and determinants of social and health inequalities in ageing popula-tions.

Organiser Eilidh Macmillan, NHS Highland lead social worker (south and mid), said: “There were several aims of the conference, most notably to raise awareness of what drives inequalities in older people, and to examine patterns of inequalities in later life and how it relates to our development of policy and practice.”

By Evelyn Newman, NHS Highland nutritian and dietetics adviser, care homes AT the start of this year, if any-one had said to me that I’d be actively promoting tweeting at work, I’d have dismissed them out of hand.

However, at the time of writing this, I now have 190 followers from all levels of the NHS, social care, a range of agencies, com-panies and colleagues.

The turning point came in January, when I was accepted, as a representative of NHS High-land, onto Cohort 3 of the NES (NHS Scotland Education Ser-vices) e-NMAHP leadership pro-gramme.

Aimed at improving confidence in the use of new and available technologies, one of the first tasks we had to complete was to set up a twitter account.

Armed with my iPad at home, I was forced to ask for help from an expert: one who cannot func-tion without iTechnology; who starts and ends the day on social media; whose whole life revolves around technology: one of my 16-year-old twin daughters!

To say she was horrified is an

understatement: “You’re not go-ing on Twitter!” “You’re not follow-ing me!” “What do you mean you have to do it for work?”

However, once she got over the initial shock and had finally agreed that she would not follow my Twitter account, we moved forward with a common purpose and I started to learn how to ‘like’, retweet, search and follow. Within 24 hours I had the courage to re-tweet but it took many more be-fore I felt brave enough to write my first one: overseen, of course, by a proud teenager!

A couple of months later life was transformed even further when I received my first iPhone for work and the second twin daughter set it up with Twitter … so much more accessible!

During Dietitians Week, with Debbie Provan’s help, I even managed to write for the NHSScotland AHP blog site and tweeted about the events of the week to all my followers, sharing good news stories about dieti-tians around the country and re-acquainting myself with col-leagues who I hadn’t had contact with for years.

Since then I have managed to tweet/retweet 1500 times and

‘liked’ many others. I hope that some of you have benefitted from information in some of them or have felt encouraged by a ‘like’ or a ‘retweet’.

I have discovered many agen-cies, people and groups that I had been unaware of, which pro-vided lots of useful information and connections that have been relevant and helpful for my work.

The tweets, which prompt and remind me of events and those which share new resources or contacts are great because they open up whole new aspects of work, which I might never have normally come across and even if I’d searched for them it would have taken up huge amounts of time.

I’ve written this article to en-courage those of you who still don’t have a twitter account, to seriously consider setting one up and trying it for yourself. No mat-ter how long it takes to send your first tweet I’ll guarantee it’ll be worth it. Social media at work can be a real bonus, if you use it to your advantage. Your teenagers might even help you get started too!

Feel free to use my account to start. @evelynnewman17

To tweet or not to tweet A dietician’s story of how Twitter changed her work

Conference investigates inequalities and older people

- 31 -

What’s your

story? Keep

Highlights

informed

Do you know of something

you think should be featured

in Highlights? An award, an

achievement, a piece of re-

search, an appointment, a

retiral … you name it, High-

lights has a place for it.

Please send your articles

f o r H i g h l i g h t s t o

[email protected] (01463

704903) or visit the Staff

Dropbox on the NHS High-

land intranet home page.

You can follow NHS Highland on:

WEBSITE

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FACEBOOK https://www.facebook.com/

NHSHighland

TWITTER

www.twitter.com/NHSHighland or @NHSHighland

ARGYLL and Bute residents who are deaf or have hearing loss are to benefit from specially-designed alarms in a bid to help them stay safe from fire in the home.

A partnership between the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service (SFRS), Argyll and Bute Council and NHS Highland has seen £3,000 allocated to buy the poten-tially life-saving devices.

The smoke alarms are connected to a powerful un-der-pillow pad that vibrates in the event of a fire to im-mediately wake someone with limited or no hearing.

Group manager David Cowley, the SFRS head of prevention and protection in the area, said: “We’re de-termined to make sure everyone in Argyll and Bute is protected by appropriate and effective fire detection systems and this partnership means we can provide people who are deaf or hearing-impaired with exactly that.”

Elaine Garman, head of public health in Argyll and Bute for NHS Highland, said: “Those with a significant hearing loss can be extremely vulnerable especially at night-time, when they are likely to have taken their hearing aid out to sleep.

“Smoke alarms are a very cost-effective way to keep people safe, particularly if you have a hearing loss.

“We have been delighted to work together not only to pool money to purchase this specially-designed equip-ment but for a coordinated response between audiol-ogy, social services sensory impairment team and the fire and rescue service.”

Elaine continued: “I would encourage those who think they can benefit to contact the freephone number below.”

Free home fire safety visits are available by calling SFRS on the freephone number 0800 073 1999, texting ‘FIRE’ to 80800 or filling in an online form at www.firescotland.gov.uk.

Fire alarms

to be given to

people with

hearing loss

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Highland Health Sciences Library

Where have all our

By Rob Polson ([email protected]), subject librarian

TO paraphrase Pete Seeger and Joe Hick-erson’s song title Where have all the flowers gone? – the library is asking: “Where have all our users gone?”

The library’s gate entry system may appear rather unfriendly and imposing but one of the main reasons for having it in place is to collect statistics on library usage.

These statistics are analysed weekly and are showing us some interesting trends which are illustrated in the two weekly ‘snapshot’ pie charts shown below.

Figure 1 shows that in 2006 our biggest users were student nurses, NHS Highland staff, NHS Education Scotland (NES trainee grades) and general practitioners.

In Figure 2 you can see that in 2015 student

nurses and NHS Highland staff still are our big-gest user groups, followed by Aberdeen Univer-sity medical students and other students on placements.

There are now no GP users present and NES usage has also shrunk.

Further analysis of the figures reveals that us-age from the rural areas has shrunk – for exam-ple staff and trainees based in the Belford and Caithness General Hospitals used to use us a lot, now hardly anyone from these locations uses the resource.

When the visitor statistics are examined we find that overall visits to the library have also re-duced.

Pete Seeger by kind permission of Anthony Pepitone Joe Hickerson by kind permission of Ell Smith

Continued on next page

- 33 -

Highland Health Sciences Library

For example, in 2006-07 we had c19,000 visits whereas in 2014-15 thus has reduced to 14,000 visits

What is going on? Are, for example, the online resources of the Knowledge Network be-ing used instead?

Investigations into usage of this set of re-sources however have shown that these are not being used either.

Informal enquiries into the levels of underuse have revealed that some of the factors involved include: increased workloads, reliance on guide-lines, reliance on personal sets of resources (apps, textbooks and other resources) unavail-able on the Knowledge Network, general un-

awareness, and lack of knowledge of the tools and how to utilise them.

Readers are welcome to share their reasons for underuse with us - we would really appreciate this feedback – please contact me ([email protected]) with these.

Remember, whatever your needs the Highland Health Sciences Library exists to help you. As Peterson, Harris and Siemensa (http://t.co/7kfutCREya) state: “There is a substantial and growing body of evidence that health librar-ies are vital to the delivery of healthcare, both financially and clinically.”

Don’t spend more than 10 minutes on a prob-lem you may be having – contact the library.

To find out more about the library and its many services call 01463 255600 (x7600).

Continued from previous page

IF you can read between the lines, you can save lives. That was the message Choose Life sent out to people in Argyll and Bute to mark Suicide Preven-tion Week, from 7th-12th Sep-tember.

Last year, 15 people in Argyll and Bute took their own lives, leaving a lasting impact on fami-lies, friends and communities.

Choose Life is tackling this through its ‘Read between the Lines’ campaign, which calls on everyone to be alert to the warn-ing signs of suicide in people close to them. The message is that if you’re worried about some-one, such as a friend, family member or workmate, asking them directly about their feelings can help to save their life.

The campaign acknowledges that signs of suicide can be am-biguous, but encourages people to take all signs of distress seri-ously, even if the person seems to be living a normal life. It also aims to assure people that asking a person about what’s troubling

them can make a positive differ-ence.

Tracy Preece, Choose Life co-ordinator in Argyll and Bute said: “You tend to know when some-one close to you isn’t quite them-selves. So if you notice any changes in their behaviour that worry you – even if the signs come and go – ask them about it.

“You’ll find that talking can help a person get clarity about what it is that’s troubling them, and often gives a sense of per-spective. Starting a conversation is half the battle.

“If it feels right, ask if they are thinking about suicide. It won’t put the thought in their head if it wasn’t there before, but it can be a big relief for them to be able to say, ‘yes, I am’ and acknowledge they need help.”

The campaign targets men and women who are likely to be in greatest contact with people most at risk of suicide – men aged 30-59, since statistics show that around three-quarters of sui-cides have been men in every

year since 1990. To support people in Argyll &

Bute to get behind the campaign, Choose Life has made widely available information cards with simple ‘how to help’ steps, and leaflets such as ‘The Art of Con-versation’, which gives advice on starting conversations about sui-cide and listening effectively.

Raising awareness of suicide prevention and giving the public information is a vital part of the work of Choose Life.

Scotland’s suicide rate has been decreasing since 2002 with the latest figures showing that that they are at their lowest level since the 1970s.

Choose Life in Argyll and Bute has made a key contribution by hosting an annual conference to raise awareness of suicide as a public health issue, training over 200 people every year to identify the signs that someone is strug-gling with thoughts of suicide and how to help as well as working in schools to raise awareness of help-seeking.

A friendly word can save a life

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What’s your role, Crawford?

I am responsible for catering, portering, security,

accommodation, telecoms and the mailroom at

Raigmore.

How would you describe yourself?

Very positive. I enjoy challenges and working at

Raigmore.

Do you have any hobbies and interests?

Eating out and exercising — and I’m a petrol

head.

What was the first single you ever bought?

Blondie – Parallel Lines.

What is your favourite food?

I love both Chinese and Indian food.

How about your favourite film?

Double Jeopardy with Ashley Judd

Do you have a favouriteTV programme?

Programmes like Location Location Location – oh,

and Big Brother.

What about a favourite book?

Anything by Martina Cole and James Patterson.

If you won £10 million in the lottery, what

would you spend it on?

I’d have a fleet of sports cars and I’d buy a house

abroad and one in Devon and Cornwall.

What is you won a smaller sum, say £1,000?

I’d go on an additional holiday.

What are you pet hates?

Bad manners

If you could have dinner with three people,

dead or alive, who would they be and what

would you cook them?

Lorraine Kelly, Cheryl Fernandez-Versini and Olly

Murs. I’d cook an Indian buffet.

What are the best and worst parts of your job?

The best are the people I work with; I do work

with some really nice people and have a really

good supportive management team under me.

The worst part is the financial challenges we face.

& Q

A Answering the questions this

month is Crawford Howat, ser-vice manager — hotel ser-vices at Raigmore Hospital