Welcome to our March 2024 Bulletin

/Board Members 2022/543A8566

Dear Colleagues

Spring is on its way! I am sure, like me, you are welcoming the start of the ‘lighter’ mornings and evenings – as I drove into work this morning, there was signs of spring appearing with blossom on the trees! As spring commences, we start to think about the new financial year. I am sure many of you have already been involved in budget setting, so please ensure you have secured the funding for your Service to renew its Network membership– see item 1 below for details of the excellent packages available.

Having spoken to a few colleagues over the last month or so, I am conscious that many of us are involved in work around the increasing prevalence of measles. Once again, the importance of staff protection and vaccination is being highlighted. Whilst I know this is causing additional work for teams, hopefully this is a further reminder to Trusts of the important role of occupational health services. We have ensured the Clinical Guidance area of our website has been updated with the links to the key documents. 

Best wishes

Hilary Winch

Chair, NHS Health at Work Network

 

In this edition:

1. It’s Time to Renew your NHS Network Membership!

2. Growing OH&WB Breakfast Club Meetings

3. Sharing Good Practice: Resources for Members

4. Network Member Discount: Certificate in Managing OH

5. Delivering Healthcare: A Complex Balancing Act

Advertorial: ISHAW

6. Protecting Lone Workers

7. MoHaWK

8. Working Minds

9. West Midlands Region Network Board Rep Vacancy

10. Latest News and Resources

 

1.    It’s Time to Renew your NHS Network Membership!

We have recently sent out the application and renewal forms for membership of the Network.  We are delighted to maintain a brilliant range of membership packages so that you can choose the right one for your team and organisation. Full membership is the only way to guarantee your place at our highly acclaimed annual conference on 11 and 12 September 2024, and which had a 100% satisfaction rating in 2023! 

If you haven’t seen your renewal forms, or are interested in joining the 95% of NHS occupational health teams in England who subscribed to our Network in 2023, please get in touch via admin@nhshealthatwork.co.uk  

2.    Growing OH&WB Breakfast Club Meetings

All occupational health and wellbeing professionals, organisational senior leaders and anyone involved or interested in improving occupational health and wellbeing services are invited to book onto any of the Growing OHWB breakfast sessions over the coming year. The sessions will be chaired by Dr Shriti Pattani – NHS England National Clinical Expert in Occupational Health and Wellbeing. 

The next session is on Thursday 25 April 2024, 08.30 - 09.30

To register to attend any of these sessions, please email growing.ohwb@nhs.net

More information, including the other dates throughout the year, is available here.

3.    Sharing Good Practice: Resources for Members

Clinical Guidance – Measles: Following the briefings from NHS England and the updated UKHSA National Measles Guidance, the Clinical Guidance area within the website has been updated. 

Shared practice – Health Surveillance – can you help? Thank you to those of you who have shared aspects of good clinical practice over the last year. This month’s request is surrounding health surveillance. Do you have examples of any of the following you are happy to share: 

  • health surveillance Screening forms 
  • Examples of Fitness certificates /. Outcome reports sent to line managers / organisations. 
  • Examples of reporting anonymised data to organisations 

Please send these through to admin@nhshealthatwork.co.uk We can oblige by taking off any reference to your own Trust if you prefer, or we will happily leave logos on so that you can be acknowledged for your contribution.  

4.    Network Member Discount: Certificate in Managing OH 

The At Work Partnership are pleased to offer NHS Health at Work Network Members a discount of £200+VAT for places on their Certificate in Managing Occupational Health Services course. This fantastic three-day Certificate programme, a virtual course running from 14 – 16 May 2024, is designed to equip you with the essential management tools to deliver a successful occupational health service. Occupational health professionals attending this course will come away with the knowledge to manage their department with confidence, financial acumen, legal awareness, and the wider management skills to develop their department’s work. 

Book and pay by 15 March 2024 to qualify for the early bird rates. For more information and to secure your place visit: https://bit.ly/CMOHS24

5.    ‘Delivering Healthcare: A Complex Balancing Act’

The University of Surrey has published ‘Delivering healthcare: a complex balancing act’. This guide is designed to help managers and leaders understand the key actions they can take to support nurses, midwives, and paramedics to thrive at work and deliver high quality care to patients, often in challenging and emotionally taxing circumstances. The guide forms part of an NIHR-funded research project that ran for two years, completing in October 2022. 

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6.    Protecting Lone Workers

Lone workers can be at greater risk of harm as they may not have anyone to help or support them if things go wrong. Employers should provide training, supervision, monitoring, and support for those working alone.

The HSE leaflet 'Protecting lone workers: How to manage the risks of working alone' is free to download. It is for anyone who employs lone workers, or engages them as contractors etc., including self-employed people or those who work alone. 

The leaflet is supported by the HSE lone working webpages which include advice aimed at lone workers themselves. A lone workers video is also available, setting out the key advice.

7.    MoHaWK

We are delighted to be able to continue our association with the Faculty of Occupational Medicine in offering MoHaWK to NHS Network members at a heavily discounted rate as part of our membership packages. MoHaWK is an OH clinical audit and benchmarking tool, which supports teams in their audit programmes and provides invaluable evidence as part of SEQOHS accreditation. A MoHaWK license purchased directly from the FOM costs £475 +VAT, and so by purchasing one of the Network membership packages incorporating MoHaWK, you are making a considerable saving! 

Round 24 opened on 1 January 2024 for data input and will stay open until the commencement of the following Round. The briefing notes for Round 24 are available here. If you have any specific queries, then please contact hilary.winch@nnuh.nhs.uk

8.    Working Minds

The Health and Safety Executive’s Working Minds campaign is driving change across Britain's workplaces by helping to raise awareness of how employers can prevent stress and support good mental health. When you sign up to their Working Minds campaign ebulletin, you can access a calendar of awareness days, weeks and months for 2024, along with creative resources for you to use and share with your networks and channels. Sign up to the Working Minds ebulletin

Other Working Minds resources and information that you can access on their campaign website include:

 

 9.    West Midlands Region NHS Network Board Rep Vacancy

We have a vacancy on our Network Board for the West Midlands region. Applications are invited from Network Member colleagues working in this region, to join our Network Board. For an informal discussion and/or an application form, contact Andrew Gilbey, General Manager at admin@nhshealthatwork.co.uk and submit your application by no later than Friday 15 March. 

10. Latest News and Resources

The Health and Occupation Research (THOR) network, including OPRA (Occupational Physicians' Reporting Activity), administered by The University of Manchester, serves as a crucial resource for occupational physician-reported data on work-related ill-health (WRIH) in the UK. The THOR team seeks support of physicians within the Health at Work programme to sustain data collection efforts. THOR's data are vital as they represent the sole medically verified, nationwide database of WRIH data in the UK. Participation in THOR offers several benefits, including formal recognition for contributions, access to THOR CPD accreditation, quarterly newsletters and annual reports, a data request service for WRIH queries, and monthly online educational seminars. For more information please see the leaflet attached or visit the THOR website - https://sites.manchester.ac.uk/thor

The SOM is running a free webinar on the impact of asbestos on the health of workers on 19 March 12-1pm. Sign-up at https://www.som.org.uk/civicrm/event/info?reset=1&id=669

NHS Employers has redesigned its Sickness Absence Toolkit. The open-access toolkit is designed to supports line managers ‘through all phases of staff sickness absence’, offering good-practice advice on absence reporting, making workplace adjustments for frequent and/or long-terms absences, and supporting staff while away from work. The updated version includes new resources to help with the common causes of absence and signposts to additional support and guidance.

Congratulations to Dr. Robin Cordell who has been appointed as the new President Elect of the Faculty for Occupational Medicine. Dr Cordell brings a wealth of experience to the role. He is in day-to-day practice as an occupational physician and Chair of a social enterprise delivering occupational health services and providing specialty training, with five GMC approved posts, and also supporting doctors progressing towards CESR. He has held senior medical leadership roles in Defence, been a past President of SOM, and is a director of the Council for Work and Health. He is an examiner for the DOccMed and MFOM Part 2/AFOM, and led on the recent SEQOHS Standards Review for the Faculty.

If you work with hazardous substances, the HSE Control of Substances Hazardous to Health (COSHH) website can help you understand the actions you should take to stay healthy. Download the free publication Working with substances hazardous to health: A brief guide to COSHH, which explains how to control exposure and comply with the Regulations.

Regulations giving workers ‘day one’ rights to request flexible working come into effect on 6 April 2024. The Flexible Working (Amendment) Regulations 2023 remove the current requirement for an employee to have 26 weeks of continuous service.

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The NHS Health at Work Network brings together all OH teams providing health and wellbeing services to NHS OH staff.  It is dedicated to providing consistent, high-quality health at work services to all NHS staff through collaborative working.

Members of OH teams in NHS Health at Work Network member organisations can receive the bulletin and access the restricted areas of the website as a membership benefit – if you are not sure of your login details email admin@nhshealthatwork.co.uk  

Please share this bulletin with colleagues and encourage them to register to receive it regularly.  Non-Network members can also register to receive the monthly bulletin here.

You can contact the Network through your regional representative or as shown below.  Please get in touch if you have any queries or comments, if there is anything you would like to see in future issues of the bulletin, or if you have news to share.

Hilary Winch, Chair                                                  hilary.winch@nnuh.nhs.uk

Andrew Gilbey, General Manager                       admin@nhshealthatwork.co.uk

The NHS Health at Work Network does not, directly, or indirectly, endorse any product or service that is, or will, be provided by any of our Supporters. Organisations which become NHS Health at Work Network Supporters will not, in any way, state or imply that the NHS Health at Work Network endorses any such product or service that they provide. 

Postal address: NHS Health at Work, PO Box 857, York YO31 6FR