It’s a simple fact of life for everyone, whoever you are, that some weeks are just easier than others – and of course the flip side of that is that some are very difficult indeed.
I won’t deny that at times this week has felt like the latter and as I sit here reflecting on all that has been achieved and everything that remains to be conquered, I can’t help but wonder if sometimes we create issues, over complicate the answer to some really obvious questions and generally make life harder than it needs to be.
I think this sense is generally rooted more in the culture of an organisation, a particular department or an individual team, rather than simple facts or a challenge or issue. It’s the overlay of personal feelings, anxieties maybe or emotions that cloud what may otherwise be an easy call. Perhaps what people refer to sometimes as ‘wood’ and ‘trees’.
For the NHS to function effectively this, of course, involves the values and behaviours colleagues commit to on a corporate footing – as one team and as a wider system across many interconnected organisations that make up our health and social care system.
But also and importantly we need our patients and visitors to also commit to agreed parameters of what’s acceptable or not – even in high stress, emotional and distressing situations. How we behave, act – treat each other at its most base level – is often going to be the difference between a positive experience and a negative one and I have spoken many times about how we have to work together to achieve the most positive outcomes for everyone.
Regular readers of the blog, colleagues across all services and settings and the majority of our patients and their families will recognise that on the whole ELHT gets this right. We support each other, we acknowledge the challenging environment is not something that has been created or, indeed, can be easily or quickly fixed – and hold onto our values, treating people with compassion and kindness, to steady the ship in the most difficult of times.
This joint approach – an unwritten agreement between clinician and patient or between colleagues if you like – is at the heart of our success on most days even against the backdrop of making huge financial savings, coping with ongoing industrial action, managing the ever-increasing pressures on services and trying to improve the huge challenges surrounding urgent and emergency care.
That we do work as one across the Trust, the system and the community is our greatest strength - and let’s never forget that ‘to be successful’ in the NHS means caring effectively for people, saving or prolonging lives and making a difference for those who are suffering.
But something that put me in mind that we perhaps make things more difficult than they need to be was an update on our approach to security in our hospitals, which included a request to renew the technology we use, including body worn cameras for colleagues.
At first glance the paper would seem fair enough, an appropriate topic to table and discuss for a large Trust with a team of over 9,000 people and one of the busiest A&E departments in the UK.
But, if you stop and think, should we need security and state of the art tech for security officers to capture images and provide evidence when the worst occurs?
Remember, we’re talking about a health care setting. We only exist to care for people in their time of need.
Of course we have and operate a standard ‘zero tolerance’ policy approach to violence, verbal aggression or any inappropriate behaviour and we uphold it with energy and pride. We won’t stand for anything inappropriate towards colleagues or patients and their families and we take action on every incident that occurs.
All of this takes time and money to manage though – and that’s without the more destructive impact on colleagues who are subjected to abuse and often need time to recover both physically and emotionally, when they would prefer to focus on their work. Please, don’t make our lives harder than they need to be – we’re doing our best in very difficult circumstances, just like you.
On this note, I want to acknowledge that being in hospital yourself or with someone else is stressful and I recognise that getting well is your number one priority above anyone or anything else. In urgent and emergency care or within the critical or intensive care settings feelings are amplified and exacerbated, as every action can be a life or death moment for the patient.
The team understands that and are highly trained and experienced to provide support, as well as how to dig deep into their own personal resilience banks when they need to.
This week we have heard from the Government of their intention to introduce ‘Martha’s Rule’ into the NHS nationally after the sad death of 13-year old Martha Mills in 2021, who developed sepsis in hospital, where she had been admitted with a pancreatic injury after falling off her bike.
Martha’s family’s raised concerns about her deteriorating condition which were not responded to promptly and last year a coroner ruled she would probably have survived if she’d been moved to intensive care earlier.
The general sense of Martha’s Rule is that all patients, families, carers and colleagues will be able to request a rapid review from different clinicians in critical care if they are worried about someone’s condition and feel they’re concerns are not being heard. This will be advertised around the NHS from April this year and available 24/7/365.
I’m pleased to say that ELHT will implement this system next month in response to feedback from local patients and their families, as well as our own team. Called ‘Call For Concern’ it will promote a phone number which anyone can use if they want to escalate their concerns.
Whilst we would always encourage visitors to speak to the immediate team on the ground first, we all know that these things can come on quickly and often families and especially parents are best placed to know immediately when things are going wrong better than anyone. Intuition is a very powerful thing and Call For Concern will help people raise concerns quickly, providing assurance that there is always somewhere to turn to for help.
Lastly, and on a slightly lighter note, I’ve no doubt the relentlessly gloomy weather which has dropped solid anchor over East Lancashire in the last few weeks is casting an extra grey shadow on life but in typically British style, I have heard a number of remarks about the never-ending rain which have made me chuckle through the tough times.
And so in a bid to end with something a bit more upbeat, I’ll share my favourite, a summary of our seasons which provided some useful clarification. Spring – two months, Summer – eight minutes, Autumn – three weeks and Winter – seven years. It certainly feels like it this week, doesn’t it?
Don’t make it any harder for yourself and others. Do what you need to, be kind to yourself and when you’re not working get some rest. The winter will end and, if we’re extra lucky, so will this rain one day.
Have a good week,
Martin