Part of Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust
Connect
The newsletter for Trust members with an interest in heart and lung care
August 2021
A message from Membership
This issue of Connect marks one year since its launch in July 2020. Introduced at a time when the world was – and still is – in the grip of a global pandemic, forcing millions into isolation and to disconnect from the familiar, Connect hoped to offer a way for our members to stay connected with our hospitals, receive updates on our services and activity, and attend a host of virtual events that would allow members to hear from and interact with our teams across the Trust.
Fast forward to now and we are proud at how many of you have engaged with our content in the past 12 months; attended monthly webinars which covered a range of topics, from health and wellbeing, to the Covid-19 vaccination programme; got involved with the public and patient engagement group to shape how our services are planned and delivered; participated in charity and fundraising events; and joined our innovation team to help design new systems to improve patient experience.
Thank you for your exceptional support and involvement throughout the past 12 months. There is a lot of exciting work going on across our hospitals as part of the enlarged Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust and we look forward to keeping you connected.
In order to help us continue to improve your experience as a member for the next 12 months, we would appreciate your completing this short survey.
Nancy
Nancy Dickinson
Membership Manager
Please complete this short survey so we can improve your membership experience.
Click here to access the survey.
The survey will take about 5 minutes to complete.
Important information for patients and visitors in light of new government guidance
On Monday 19th July, new government guidance came into force for England, lifting a series of Covid-19 restrictions as part of the final stage of the government’s four-step roadmap for lifting lockdown.
Across our hospitals, the safety of our patients and staff is paramount, and we will continue to observe the measures we currently have in place to keep everyone safe during their visit. This follows the guidelines set by Public Health England that state that everyone accessing or visiting healthcare settings must continue to wear a face covering and follow social distancing rules.
Visiting has not yet returned to normal levels and continues to be carefully managed.
Further information on what we are doing to keep you safe during your visit can be found here.
Royal Brompton Hospital consultant awarded Honorary Fellowship by the American Society of Echocardiography
Professor Roxy Senior, has been selected as an Honorary Fellow of the American Society of Echocardiography. This Honorary Fellowship is presented to echocardiographers outside the United States who have made a significant contribution to the field of cardiovascular ultrasound imaging, inspiring clinicians through their research and leadership.
Echocardiography is a non-invasive imaging technique that uses ultrasound waves to create pictures of the structure and function of the heart. This Honorary Fellowship is presented to echocardiographers outside the United States who have made a significant contribution to the field of cardiovascular ultrasound imaging, inspiring clinicians through their research and leadership. Professor Senior is the first from the UK to be presented with this prestigious title.
The echocardiography department at Royal Brompton and Harefield hospitals has national and international recognition and is recognised internationally as a centre of excellent standards of clinical practice in echocardiography. Read more here.
Heart failure team is awarded funding for their research into implantable devices
Funding has been awarded by Abbott, a medical devices and health care company, to support the heart failure team at Royal Brompton and Harefield hospitals on research into implantable devices. The funding was secured by Professor Martin Cowie, consultant cardiologist at Royal Brompton Hospital where he leads the heart failure service.
Implantable devices are just one of the ways clinicians are using technology to monitor patients remotely, which has become an increasingly significant part in care delivery during the Covid-19 pandemic. Like many other departments, the heart failure team, led by Professor Cowie, have had to adapt how they conduct clinical work at a time when healthcare settings have had to reduce face-to-face consultations and explore different ways to deliver patient care.
Commenting on this change, Professor Cowie said; “The term ‘techcelleration’ has been used to describe the sudden shift towards more remote care, with 10 years of change happening in a matter of months. This has been challenging for both patients and healthcare professionals, but when there is such an obvious need, people are happy to use whatever tools are available.” Read more.
ITU nurse shares his pride at George Cross NHS honour
In July, the NHS was awarded the George Cross, the highest civilian gallantry award, by Her Majesty the Queen. Here, one ITU nurse shares why he’s so proud.
Jim Head, intensive care senior staff nurse at Harefield, has worked in intensive care for 21 years.
He says, “The battle NHS colleagues were fighting was enormous and I kept thinking they should be recognised for their dedication through it. As someone who likes history, I knew about the George Cross – it’s the highest honour that can be given to civilians, and it was once given to the people of Malta for their resilience in the Second World War.”
The George Cross was instituted in 1940 by King George for ‘acts of the greatest heroism or of the most conspicuous courage in circumstances of extreme danger’.
Jim continues: “So I wrote to Boris Johnson and suggested it be awarded to the NHS.
“You can imagine my surprise and pride when I woke up to the news on 5 July with an announcement from Her Majesty the Queen that the George Cross had been awarded to the NHS.
“I have no idea if my email had any influence at all. It could have already been on the cards, and maybe I wasn’t the only one to put the idea forward. Regardless, I was elated. This is an award that everyone in the health service, across the four nations, can feel proud of. Like many people in the NHS, I work with exceptional people and their courage and commitment deserve to be recognised.
“Very few people will have ever worked under the pressures and strains that Covid has presented, and receiving the honour of the George Cross cements that in history.”
Critical care patients and their families join virtual patient day
Royal Brompton’s Adult Intensive Care Unit (AICU) team organised two virtual patient days for critical care patients and their family members to ‘revisit’ the hospital and speak to staff who cared for them.
The events were held for patients who had been admitted to the AICU for elective or emergency surgery, and for Covid-19 patients. Family members were also invited and gave a valuable insight into how it felt to have a loved one in AICU in the middle of a global pandemic.
Jo Tillman, senior nurse and AICU matron, said: “We are very pleased to offer these patient days. It is an important step in the road to recovery for many patients, as it can help them gain a sense of closure. Staff get a lot out of it too. It’s really humbling, to see how people have survived and the progress they have made.
“The day also provides former patients, their relatives and healthcare professionals the opportunity to discuss any ways we could improve our service for people who come into critical care in the future. It gives patients the chance to reconnect with the intensive care team and make links with others who have been in the same situation.”
Patients appreciated the event, with one commenting, “Thank you so much for organising the day, I appreciate it. Must have taken a lot of work, but it meant so much to me as a patient to know we are not forgotten when we leave hospital. Thank you again.”
New imaging centre progress update
The new imaging centre at Royal Brompton Hospital has steadfastly progressed since the construction phase began in January 2020. Internal and external work is almost complete – scaffolding has come down and the new facade of the centre is plain to see from Dovehouse Street, while preparations are underway for the installation of imaging equipment, beginning with magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scanners, which were installed in July. You can view an interactive timeline which tracks the development of the imaging centre here. Find out more about the new imaging centre here.
Get invovled:
Rb&hArts and young people from Trailblazers, the hospitals' youth forum, appointed Rumbidzai Savanhu to co-design the imaging centre’s paediatric waiting area with youth patients from 13 to 25 years old. Rumbidzai is a Birmingham-based illustrator and graphic artist with a distinctive style and a love of bold colours. Rb&hArts will be offering creative ways to get involved in this design project. If you are interested, get in touch!
Violinist Adrian Garrett
Photograph taken by Elam Forrester
The launch of Harefield’s sensory gardens was celebrated with workshops, tours and music
The sun came out to welcome staff and patients to the launch of Harefield’s three sensory gardens in early July. Following months of cultivation, the Rowan garden, the Healing garden and the Peace garden, which were created to help improve mental and physical wellbeing, are now open and in bloom for all to enjoy.
The launch was organised by the arts team to encourage patients and staff to make use of the gardens. Members of the team held tours of each garden, showing the diverse range of plants, while Harefield History Society walked people around the grounds, providing a history of the hospital. Groundwork London, which works with communities on sustainability initiatives, held gardening and mindfulness workshops, while patient entertainer and violinist Adrian Garratt performed throughout the event.
The gardens will help to increase biodiversity in the area, and patients and staff can become ‘Green Champions’ by helping to monitor the levels of biodiversity in the gardens using the iNaturalist app as well as volunteer to help maintain them (register interest here).
Karen Janody, arts manager, said: “We wanted to enhance the biodiversity at Harefield, as well as give everyone a space outdoors to enjoy. Gardens and nature have physical and mental health benefits, and we hope everyone will be able to watch the gardens grow, enjoy improved air quality and the chance to relax outdoors for many years to come.
Cultivation of Harefield’s green spaces and biodiversity – which includes the gardens, its lakes and the wildlife these attract – forms part of the Royal Brompton and Harefield’s sustainability drive contributing to achieving the NHS’s target to become carbon-neutral by 2045.
Help us build our digital future
As you may remember from the member webinar in April Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust together with King's College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust will be embarking on a journey to transform the way we deliver patient care through the Apollo programme.
The programme will deliver an electronic health record (EHR) system as well as a number of supportive technologies, replacing paper documentation, joining up patient records and making these easily accessible for our clinicians.
We have been looking for people to join our patient panel and help us build our exciting new digital system as a ‘Patient Influencer’ or ‘Lead Patient Influencer.
This opportunity is still available for those that wish to apply and we encourage you to do so.
To find out more, click here.
From the Archives
Today, NHS charities raise funds for groundbreaking research and for projects to improve patient and staff experiences. But before the creation of the NHS in 1948, hospitals like Royal Brompton depended on fundraising and charitable subscriptions to fund the basic running costs of the hospital.
The Royal Brompton and Harefield Hospitals archives illuminate some of the ways Royal Brompton hospital raised funds during the time it primarily treated tuberculosis (TB) – then endemic in the UK. Describing the disease’s ability to affect anyone, fundraising materials distributed at the time stated that “Consumption respects neither persons nor classes” and emphasised the duty of the well and the well-off to care for those affected. Thankfully, successful treatment of TB became possible with the advent of antibiotics, and today Royal Brompton cares for patients with a wide range of cardiac and respiratory conditions.
To find out more about Royal Brompton’s early fundraising and role as a tuberculosis hospital, you can visit Barts Health NHS Trust Archives, where archival records of Royal Brompton and Harefield are held.
Meet Trudy Nickels- your Carer Governor
What is your connection with the Trust?
I have a 15 year old son with complex congenital heart disease, he has had many operations and procedures at Royal Brompton. I am also CEO of The Brompton Fountain, the charity for children/young people and families seen under Royal Brompton and Harefield Hospitals.
What motivated you to run for governor?
I am passionate about helping make improvements to patient care and ensuring the patient/carer voice is heard when changes are made within the Trust. Royal Brompton Hospital has been a huge part of my life for over a decade, both personally and professionally, and also I wanted to give a little something back for the incredible care we have received.
What Council of Governors working groups do you hope to contribute to?
I plan to attend as many of the working group meetings as I can. I am particularly interested in getting involved in the ‘Quality and Engagement’ group as I have extensive experience working closely with patients and their families and hope that I can use this knowledge to help make a difference.
MEMBER EVENTS
Invitation to become a Peer Leader
We invite you to register for the Peer Leadership Development Programme, an innovative 4-step programme hosted by the Personalised Care Group, NHS England and NHS Improvement, aimed at people with long-term health conditions and disabilities and carers.
Steps 1 and 2 (online courses which can be accessed at any time and completed between 2 days to 4 weeks) will help you learn about personalised care and how the NHS works, including current changes.
Step 3 and 4 are blended learning (4 online sessions – one per week, followed by 4 facilitated sessions - 1 per week) will focus on personal development, your experiences and how you can become a leader to help support others and help implement change at our hospitals and across the wider NHS.
We look forward to forming a network of Peer Leaders within our hospitals who will collaborate with us, help support patients and facilitate improvements. Participants will also be invited to network with other Peer Leaders across the NHS.
To learn more, if you missed the introduction held online on 29 July, please watch the recording here.
Facilitated sessions will start in November. You must have completed steps 1, 2 and the first part of step 3 ahead of 9 November 2021. For more information please contact Nancy at [email protected].
The following online event is being planned for September 2021. Details will be added to the website in August and members will be emailed an invitation. Click here to view the member events page on our website.
Artificial Intelligence: transforming heart and lung care
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is driving innovation in the detection, diagnosis, treatment and prognosis evaluation. Hear from our teams leading ground breaking work on applications of AI to improve outcomes for heart and lung patients. Speakers will explain the role of AI, it’s current application and how it will impact the future of healthcare.
Events recordings:
In case you missed any of our recent events you can catch up on the recordings here.
YOUR MEMBERSHIP
If you would like to learn more about membership or get in contact with your governors, please email Nancy Dickinson at [email protected]