FRIDAY, 10 APRIL, 2020

Photographs attached of support staff. Full album available at www.facebook.com/NHSTayside

COVID-19: ‘Army of unseen heroes’ supporting coronavirus response

NHS Tayside Chief Executive Grant Archibald has praised the invaluable contribution of support staff in responding to the challenges of COVID-19.

Staff members have been working hard behind the scenes in areas such as Estates, Medical Physics, Switchboard Services, Laundry, Catering, Virology Labs, Transport and Logistics, IT, Portering and Domestic Services, and Site Management to help prepare the organisation and keep services running.

Chief Executive Grant Archibald said, “All of our plans in response to COVID-19 have been developed in partnership with our frontline teams. They are the experts in designing, planning and delivering the changes that we are now making in our hospitals and in communities across Tayside.

“However, to make the changes we have over the past month or so, there is a whole other army of support staff – our unseen heroes – and I want to pay tribute to those members of our workforce who perhaps are not as visible as our ward staff and clinical teams.

“These staff are making and building, cleaning and cooking, washing and driving, moving patients, moving supplies, converting and repairing critical equipment, testing and reporting samples, answering calls and generally making sure the whole NHS Tayside operation runs like clockwork.

“A big thank you to all the support staff who prop up all services in the NHS, work behind the scenes and just make it work every day.”

A few examples of the work carried out by support teams in recent weeks are:

Estates – plumbers, electricians, joiners, painters, engineers

• Redeveloped and re-purposed clinical areas to build the COVID-19 facility at Ninewells (hospital within a hospital)

• Provision of renal dialysis in alternative areas to ensure continuing care

• Built a new base for Cardiac Investigations Unit on Ninewells Concourse to prevent patients coming into the heart of the hospital

• Refurbished an old canteen area to make the new Staff Deployment Centre

• Built and refurbished the new COVID-19 Community Assessment Hubs in Arbroath, Montrose, Forfar, Dundee and Perth

• Built the new Staff Testing Facility

Medical Physics

• Repurposed 26 – and counting – anaesthetic machines as ventilators

Switchboard Services

• Increase in calls; signposting worried callers to local and national guidance; with all the moves across the hospital, ensuring callers get to the right person or department

Laundry

• Unprecedented levels of scrub suits out to staff and over 5,000 additional suits have been put into the system to support increasing clinical demand

• More resources also added in sewing room to meet escalating demand for uniforms to support those who have joined organisation or have secured alternative roles

Central Decontamination Unit

• Although not so much elective activity, the CDU staff have turned their hand to other critical roles and stepped in to support laundry, switchboard and the Staff Redeployment Centre

Catering

• Ensured new Community Assessment Hubs have access to food and drink

• Supported hospital staff with pre-ordering food and drinks for collection or delivery

• Continued to provide high quality food to patients across all of our hospitals

Virology Labs

• Virology laboratory at Ninewells now processing almost 300 COVID-19 tests every day

• Seven-day testing service

• Increase in capacity enabled NHS Tayside to become the first Health Board in the country to test health and social care staff and their household contacts

• Results turned around within 24 hours

Transport and Logistics

• Additional waste and specimen runs to the Community Hubs

• PPE runs to GPs and community sites

• More vehicles and drivers for renal service

• Additional resources for rapid PPE distribution across sites, to GPs and communities

Portering Service

• Additional equipment (wheelchairs and trolleys) to support demands on the service

• Equipment moves to support realignment of wards across multiple sites

• Specimen runs increased to meet demand on site

• Provision of increased waste collection and laundry delivery for COVID-19 wards

Domestic Services

• Providing a full service 24/7 for Ninewells and PRI to adapt to new site configurations

• Over 50 new recruits trained in the last month

• Clear split of staff for COVID-19 and non-COVID-19 areas

Site Management and Support Office

• ID badges and security access to 750 new members of staff, brought on board from across NHS Tayside to support the COVID-19 response. 

• Integral to supporting GPs to be able to access the community hubs

Contact:

Louise Wilson

NHS Tayside Communications

(01382) 740718