Date published: 16 August 2021
Health and wellbeing
Never has “work/life balance” been more tested than during the pandemic. People have worked harder, smarter and have embraced new ways of doing things, but avoiding burnout is essential, so I hope you’re able to find some opportunity to recharge your personal batteries. Everyone on the Board of Directors is grateful for your continued hard work and dedication to maintain the highest level of care for our patients.
Maintaining resilience is crucial to our general wellbeing. Mersey Care’s commitment to staff support and wellbeing has helped us through the last 18 months in ways that are difficult to measure but obvious in our continued successes. We’ve opened new sites, moved services online, won awards, led national thinking, supported colleague organisations with mutual aid, worked closer than ever with social services at borough level and simply carried on delivering great care.
For our newer colleagues formerly in North West Boroughs, a change of leadership and a raft of procedural changes have also been met and staff have responded magnificently. In the last few days, the Cheshire and Merseyside Resilience Hub went to Hollins Park Hospital in Warrington to chat to our Mid Mersey Division staff offering advice and highlighting the support on offer to the workforce. They will be visiting other bases across the Trust over the coming weeks, so keep an eye out for details.
For those who don’t know, the Resilience Hub is for NHS and local authority commissioned social care staff across our region. It’s hosted by Mersey Care and provides support and confidential interventions about issues in work or at home, and they have a wealth of resources on their website. The Granada Reports feature on their work is well worth rewatching. If you’re struggling or need some support, please take advantage of this offer.
Mersey Care has a history in mental healthcare, and we’re able to offer our experience in looking after our whole selves in hectic times with a wide range of wellbeing services and resources, including a range of curated (and often free) downloadable health apps from our partners at ORCHA.
Big decisions
Many of you will have been anxiously waiting over the last couple of weeks for news of exam results for your children, some of whom will now be considering their next step. If you know someone who is looking to join the NHS, why not consider continuing their development journey with a role in our services?
We have clinical and non-clinical vacancies available, and a wide variety of skills required to fill them. Please ask them to look at the range of things we do here as part of a learning organisation focussed on restorative just culture, ambitious personal development and more.
Digital update
I’ve thought for some time that we should hear more from our Chief Digital Information Officer, Asim Patel, given most of our lives are shaped by online services. We’re a Trust with Global Digital Exemplar (GDE) credentials and we’re increasingly playing a pivotal role across the region.
We’ve led on the development of a Patient Held Record for Cheshire and Merseyside, the expansion of Telehealth and the further development of the Combined Intelligence for Population Health Action (CIPHA) platform, which brings together data sets from both health and social care.
To take this forward, Asim will also assume the role of Managing Director for NHS Informatics Merseyside. This change is being made following an external review, endorsed by the NHS Informatics Merseyside Partnership Board, which recommended the integration of digital services across Mersey Care and the NHS Informatics Merseyside shared service.
NHS Informatics Merseyside hosted by Mersey Care will remain as a shared service hosted by the Trust. This partnership remains one of the largest examples of digital collaboration across the country. What this means for you as a patient or member of staff will be set out in detail by Asim next week.
Have a good week, thank you and stay safe.
Prof Joe Rafferty CBE
Chief Executive