Ymddiriedolaeth GIGGwasanaethau Ambiwlans Cymru

Welsh Ambulance ServicesNHS Trust

NETWORK NEWS– LISTENING TO YOUR VIEWS –

New Falls FrameworkFalls are the second most common reason for calling an ambulance in Wales, but in many of these cases an emergency ambulance is not needed. In 2017/18 we received 62,488 calls relating to falls, with just under half of these needing to be taken to hospital.

As well as responding to people in the community who have fallen, the Welsh Ambulance Service, along with the Health Boards and other organisations, has a role to play in everything from helping to prevent falls through to reducing further harm which might result from a fall. To help us deal in the best way with the different types of fall-related calls, we have developed a Framework for Falls.

The Framework for Falls looks at the best ways in which the Welsh Ambulance Service can do its work in relation to:

• Prevention – working with patients to reduce the risks of falling at home and in their communities.

• Supporting Community Resilience - helping nursing home staff and Community First Responders to more effectively deal with patients who have fallen but haven’t hurt themselves.

• Assessment – making sure that the way we assess patients over the phone results in them getting the right sort of help.

• Response – making sure that the help we send is correct depending on how badly the patient is injured.

• Avoiding Further Harm - looking at ways of reducing the amount of time a patient who has fallen has to wait for help, and at ways in which we can help patients avoid falling again in future.

The development of the Framework for Falls is an important step towards achieving a safe, appropriate and consistent response across Wales for our patients who have fallen.

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WINTER 2018-2019

WelcomeWelcome to the Winter 2018 edition of Network News.

In this edition you can learn about some of the developments being made within the Welsh Ambulance Service and find out about who we have been engaging with and listening to so we can act on what they’ve said about their experiences of using our services.

Inside this issue2 In the spotlight

3 Shoctober

4 We’re listening & learning

5 Visiting local communities

6 Information & advice at your fingertips

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IN THE SPOTLIGHT

Steve Clarke Head of Mental HealthI’m Steve Clarke and I’m head of Mental Health for the Welsh Ambulance Service.

I joined the Welsh Ambulance Service in April 2018, having previously held positions in London mental health trusts, and in mental health charities, and I was previously Deputy Director of Mental Health for England.

As Head of Mental Health for the Welsh Ambulance Service, my role entails the delivery of the Mental Health Improvement Plan for the Welsh Ambulance Service, which has three broad areas:

1) The mental wellbeing of our staff,2) Our mental health practice and3) Our mental health pathways.

This involves ensuring that our staff have access to the right treatment and the right care at the right time, ensuring that they are equipped to deal with people that have mental health problems in whatever environment they are working in, and to make sure that we work in concert

with our partners in the health boards to make sure that we’ve got referral routes-on for people so we don’t just convey them to an Emergency Department.

Since joining WAST I have been working to raise awareness of mental health problems within our workforce, and in particular to highlight the importance of talking about our mental health as an important step in de-stigmatising the subject. It is estimated that 1 in 4 people will experience a mental health condition at some point in their lives, and many of the people we work with every day will be experiencing mental illness, crisis and distress. However, some of us find it difficult to talk about our own experiences, for fear of being judged or that our employment will somehow be affected.

Our staff made this film to try and break through some of these challenges. Talking frankly about their own experiences, people from

across the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust (WAST) wanted to let others know that talking to someone really helps, that support is available and your colleagues, managers and families will support you. You can view our film here – please share it, encourage others to watch it, and above all listen.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLECRilAGFo

PATIENT STORIESThe Welsh Ambulance Service continues to collect stories from our patients so that we can understand what it’s like to be a user of our services. This can help us identify those areas in which we need to make improvements, as well as recognising when patients have received excellent care.

One of the main ways we gather stories is by recording short videos in which individuals share their experiences on camera. Hearing the story in the patient’s own words helps to bring it to life and make it more accessible to others. They make us think about the person involved, rather than just the issues being raised, making them a powerful tool that can help us reflect on the way we work and help us to develop and improve the services we offer to patients.

As a result of patients and service-users bringing us their stories, we are able to identify changes which may be needed to the way we work or how we organise our services. By recording these experiences we are also able to demonstrate how we have made improvements as a result. We recently shared a video we made of a patient in North Wales, Mr Drummond, who had experienced problems using the hospital transport service. His story helped us to identify some of the changes needed to improve the way the service operated.

You can watch Mr Drummond’s video, along with a range of others on our website https://bit.ly/1RPDOpP

If you would like to share your story of using any of our services or would like more information about storytelling, please contact the Patient Experience & Community Involvement Team on 01792 311773 or e-mail peci.team@wales.nhs.uk.

NETWORK NEWS SUMMER 18 3

WORKING BETTER TOGETHER

ShoctoberFor the fourth year running, the Trust once again visited primary schools across Wales during October to promote the ‘Shoctober’ campaign which aims to teach junior school children about appropriate use of 999 and lifesaving skills.

With the help of staff, 111 colleagues, community first responders (CFRs) and agency partners including St. John’s Ambulance, Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board Cardiac team, Swansea University nursing students and a Cwm Taf A&E Doctor, we reached over 2,100 children. Promoting the campaign via our Twitter account we also made over 46,000 Twitter impressions.

Throughout the month, we visited 38 schools across Wales, spending 103 hours with the pupils aged 7-11 helping them understand:

• How other NHS services that can help including Pharmacy & Minor Injury Units

• Appropriate use of 999• Questions asked when you call 999, what they mean and why we ask them

We aimed to give pupils the confidence and knowledge of how to look after someone while help is on its way, while also teaching them invaluable life skills including:

• How to put someone in recovery position• Demonstrate the difference between a heart attack and cardiac arrest and what they can do while help is on its way• Hands only CPR (to the tune of Baby Shark for them to know the rate of compressions)• What a defibrillator is, where they can be found and demonstrate how easy they are to use. • Ways to help someone who is choking

We would like to thank all staff, volunteers and partners who helped deliver this year’s campaign. To evaluate the success of the campaign and help shape Shoctober 2019, we will be contacting everyone who participated for feedback.

SAVE A LIFE CYMRUIn October, the Health Secretary, Vaughan Gething announced a new project to encourage more people across Wales to learn and use lifesaving skills.

Save a Life Cymru will be developed over the next two years and will improve access to cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) training and increase the awareness and use of defibrillators for people from all walks of life. As more people learn CPR they will be encouraged to share their knowledge and understanding, helping to strengthen the chain of survival that will contribute to helping improve survival rates for people suffering a cardiac arrest.

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...this is what you’ve told usWe continue to work on improving our services and appreciate the feedback we get from our service-users, which enables us to learn and improve. Here are some comments which we have recently received:

WHAT’S YOUR STORY? WE’RE LISTENING AND LEARNING

Crew listened to me as a carer, and took on my views

My telephone experience and ambulance service was excellent. Saved my daughter’s life.

They were great, very quick to come to the house. Made me feel comfortable and safe. Took me to hospital, great in the ambulance, fantastic.

An elderly lady neighbour has to be stretchered to hospital appointments and the crew are always very aware of her dignity when transferring her from bed to chair to stretcher.

Sensory LossEvery November the NHS in Wales celebrates Sensory Loss Awareness Month through a campaign called ‘It Makes Sense’. Each year an event is hosted by an NHS Wales organisation to look back at the achievements made in the NHS to improve access to services for people living with a sensory loss. This year, the Welsh Ambulance Services NHS Trust hosted an event in the Pierhead Building, Cardiff Bay on 20 November.

Sensory Loss Awareness Month aims to improve the experiences of patients with sensory loss by ensuring that they do not face barriers because of their sight or hearing loss when accessing NHS services. So, we actively encouraged our staff and volunteers to come together to celebrate the achievements of the Trust to improve its own services for people living with a sensory loss. We heard some inspiring stories, watched role plays and shared information about the Trust’s Communication App, Medical Information Card, Deaf & Hard of Hearing Section on the website and staff experiences of learning BSL level 1.

We recognise that there is still much to do to and will continue to ask, review and respond to what patients and communities tell us.

NEW LEARNING DISABILITY RESOURCES – AT A GLANCEWAST has launched a series of easy-read resources aimed at those with a learning disability. One resource in particular was the “Pre Hospital Learning Disability Information Sheet” which has become affectionately called the ‘At A Glance’ sheet.

This sheet had been developed as an aid for our front line staff to provide them with useful information to help them when they are called to an individual with a learning disability, for example, medication they take, health conditions etc. The sheet also contains information that the individual feels they would like our staff to know about them, to help

them have a better experience and feel respected.

Staff engaged and worked in partnership with individuals, community groups, NHS and third-sector organisations to develop various channels to capture, review and respond better to the needs, care, and support required as well as the level of information, advice and assistance needed for an individual with learning disabilities in an emergency.

The full range of resources developed in partnership with the learning disability community across Wales are available on the learning disability zone on the Welsh Ambulance Services’ website.

NETWORK NEWS SUMMER 18 5

Visiting local communitiesWe continued to visit different communities across Wales at open days, health fairs and partnership events. We listened to your experiences, answered your questions and shared information about campaigns and improvements happening across the service including how we respond to calls, appropriate use of 999, our Promises to Children & Young People, Careers within the Welsh Ambulance Service, Dementia awareness sessions and our Promises to Older People.

Here are just some of the people we’ve met!

Syrian Refugee FamiliesThrough partnerships within Hywel Dda equality networks, we have been engaging with Syrian families. Following on from a very successful and informative Community Safety Workshop in Aberystwyth in 2017, we attended a picnic event in Llandovery in August 2018, followed up with an information day in October 2018 in Llanelli. We have

provided a number of workshops including: introduction to WAST and how to contact the service, CPR, defibrillators, choking and the observations that we carry out if we need to respond to a call, as well as volunteering opportunities.

We are working with local families to better understand their needs and to

help increase their knowledge and awareness of WAST services. We are also working together to develop a resource pack that will provide a template that can be used to deliver information in other languages or formats, as well as further engagement opportunities with other BAME communities across Wales.

GIVE US YOUR FEEDBACK!Over the last six months, the NHS Direct Wales website has received over 1.7 million visits, however the team behind the scenes are always looking at ways to improve the site.

To do this, we look at what visitors are searching for, pages people visit and review feedback that we have received online and face to face. If you have used the website or

have ideas of how we can develop it further, please get in touch. You can email us peci.team@wales.nhs.uk, tweet us @NHSDirectWales or follow us on Facebook.

George St Primary Community Safety Project 2018 The project was set up in response to significant safety problems in the community immediately surrounding George St Primary School and Pontypool Ambulance Station. Representatives from all the Emergency Services planned together with pupil representation, to run a series of workshops. The workshops’ one main scenario showed the intervention of all 3 emergency services, demonstrating how quickly and how serious a situation can develop into, if the emergency services cannot get access. The story was enacted in a role play, forming part of a wider project on safety undertaken by the year 5 and 6 pupils.

Events culminated in an Open Day at Pontypool Ambulance Station, where children met WAST Mascots Jack and Kim. From the event’s art competition themed “Making Way for Blue lights” , 3 pictures have been selected and these are now to be made into permanent safety signs displayed outside Pontypool Ambulance

Station. We hope that there will be more awareness of safety around the George Street area as a result of this project.

6 WELSH AMBULANCE SERVICES NHS TRUST

WHAT DO YOU WANT INCLUDED? CONTACT USPlease contact us if you would like to know more about any of our features or if there is something you would like included in this newsletter. Contact the Patient Experience and Community Involvement Team by e-mail

peci.team@wales.nhs.uk or phone 01792 311773.

USEFUL WEBSITES FOR INFORMATION AND ADVICEwww.ambulance.wales.nhs.uk

www.nhsdirect.wales.nhs.uk

www.choosewellwales.org.uk

www.youtube.com/welshambulance

This newsletter is also available in Braille, other languages, large print and audio format upon request.

NHS Direct Wales Symptom CheckersDo you or a family member feel unwell?

If you are not sure what to do or who to see, then visit our easy to use online symptom checkers at www.nhsdirect.wales.nhs.uk. With over 28 topics to choose from including cough, cold, sore throat and stomach pain, all you need to do is answer a few questions and the symptom checker will do the rest, advising you who or what to do next, including simple ways you can look after yourself at home.

DATES FOR YOUR DIARYJanuary

27th Holocaust Memorial Day

February

Defibuary www.ambulance.wales, nhs.uk

7th Time to Talk Day - brings the nation together to get talking and break the silence around mental health problems www.time-to-change.org.uk

March

8th International Womens Day

INFORMATION & ADVICE AT YOUR FINGERTIPS

Thank you to our Twitter followers!

We are pleased to announce that we now have over 4,000 followers on the NHS Direct Wales Twitter account. For the latest health information, updates and developments follow us @NHSDirectWales. To find out more about our community engagement and experience work visit @WelshAmbPIH.