Lunch & Learn: event for nurses

NHS Education for Scotland is hosting a number of events specifically for those who support education, learning and development for the (current and future) health and social care workforce. It is important that care home nurses are represented at these Lunch & Learn events. If you work in health and social care nursing, please consider registering to attend one of the events scheduled over the coming months. 

3 locations still have places available:

  • Edinburgh - 2 October
  • Inverness - 24 October
  • Aberdeen  - 26 October

The Flying Start NHS lunch and learn briefings will take place on the dates stated, from 12.00 - 14.00. For more details and to register for one of these events please contact [email protected] 

Apprenticeship Levy

In their Autumn Budget of 2015, the UK Government announced that the Apprenticeship Levy would come into effect from April 2017. This levy affects all UK employers with an annual payroll of more than three million pounds and will be used to fund new apprenticeships across all sectors.

To read Scottish Care’s briefing paper on the Apprenticeship Levy, click here.

The introduction of the Apprenticeship Levy is having an impact on organisations. We are eager to ascertain the extent of this impact and the use of apprenticeships in general within the membership.

We have therefore issued a survey on the Apprenticeship Levy, which we are encouraging member organisations to take part in.

The survey can be accessed here: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/SCapprenticeship

Your responses will inform Scottish Care as to how we can best support members and advocate on their behalf in this area.

The survey will close on 1 September 2017.

Thank you in advance for your participation.

Care Inspectorate: Video Resource for Bladder & Bowel Specialist Service

The Care Inspectorate is highlighting a number of video resources available which may be of interest to our members.

The clips from the Bladder and Bowel Specialist Service relate to the following areas:

  • Bladder and Bowel Introduction
  • Know Your Symptoms
  • Improve Your Symptoms
  • Good Toileting Habits
  • The Right Fluids
  • Having a Bladder Scan
  • Completing a Fluid Volume Chart
  • Exercises to Help Your Symptoms

In order to access the educational film clips services  please register via the following link: www.nodelays.co.uk

Care in Mind: 26 September

Scottish Care will hold a Care in Mind workshop event for members on 26 September 2017 at the Renfield Centre in Glasgow.

The physical and mental wellbeing of our workforce is critical if high quality health and social care services are to be delivered to the most vulnerable people in society. Recent research by Scottish Care indicates that the pressures and demands facing the front line social care workforce are creating significant recruitment and retention challenges for employers.

Care in Mind is a practical workshop designed to explore how we can manage and promote good mental health and wellbeing of those working in care homes and care at home organisations.

Please see the full programme details below. If you wish to register for this free event, please contact [email protected] by 11 September.

#careinmind

 

Care in Mind

New research on care home workforce highlights critical recruitment, retention and sustainability concerns

Today (Monday 17 July), Scottish Care has published its most recent data on the independent sector care home workforce in Scotland.

The membership organisation for independent sector social care services – which represents almost 1000 care home, care at home, housing support and day care services for older people – surveyed its care home members on issues such as recruitment and retention of staff, payment of the Scottish Living Wage and the sustainability of services.

The findings, contained in this new report, include:

  • 42% of care home services believe paying SLW has made them less sustainable
  • Average turnover of staff in care homes is 22%, up from 17% in 2015
  • 79% of care homes have found recruitment of nurses more difficult (with 21% significantly increasing their use of agency staff)
  • 77% of care homes have staff vacancies
  • 44% of care homes rely on the EU as a recruitment pool for care staff, with 63% recruiting nurses from the EU which will potentially be significantly impacted by Brexit

Scottish Care CEO, Dr Donald Macaskill said:

“This significant report is the latest piece of research produced by Scottish Care which highlights the critical stage the care home sector finds itself in Scotland. Whilst there is much to be positive about in the description of dedicated care and support, the research also depicts a sector holding on by its fingertips. 

 “We are struggling to recruit new staff and hold on to existing staff. There is a shortage of nurses which is little short of scandalous. There is a wholly inadequate resourcing of initiatives such as the Scottish Living Wage. Put simply, care homes cannot continue to survive on the breadline. 

 “Discussions on reform are coming to a critical stage. I hope this research sharpens the minds of all involved to realise that unless we identify real positive actions which include an adequate funding of care homes, we will be in a state which will be irretrievable. 

 “There is at the moment a small number of care homes closing because they simply cannot survive. It is incumbent on government at local and national level to recognise the real dangers this sector faces today and to respond accordingly or within the year, we will be faced with a real emergency.

“We cannot continue to get care on the cheap.”

 

To read the report, click here.

To view the accompanying report infographic, click here.

Palliative and End of Life Care in Dementia

Frontline staff working in palliative and end of life care in dementia may be interested in the excellent training opportunity below, provided free of charge by NHS Education Scotland (NES) and the Scottish Social Services Council (SSSC). 

Please note that you do not necessarily need to be working toward the Promoting Excellence Framework to apply for this opportunity. 

More information and a link to apply to take part are detailed in the leaflet below:

[gview file="https://www.scottishcare.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Palliative-Care-Frontline-Staff-Draft-Flyer.September-2017-002.doc"]

Compassionate Care: free online course

 As part of the Knowledge into Action at Scale work, the Scottish Improvement Science Collaborating Centre is hosting a free online course, Compassionate Care: Getting it Right. The course will begin on the 17th of July.  

The SISCC first opened this course in October 2016, at which time nearly 10,000 health and social care practitioners, third-sector professionals, managers, students and service users joined in to share their experiences of delivering and receiving compassionate care.  

The course offers an enjoyable and enlightening continued professional development (CPD) opportunity for people working across all disciplines to learn about person-centred care and quality improvement. With 15 hours of learning over 5 weeks, the course gives learners the chance to learn from experts and peers,  and share insights from their own practice. 

Participants may choose to take part in a research study which aims to increase the evidence base around online learning in health & social care. 

NES Training Opportunity: Health & Social Care Staff

NHS Education Scotland (NES) is hosting a number of Cognitive Stimulation Therapy - Capacity Building training workshops in August. These are for individuals working with people with dementia at Enhanced and Expertise levels of practice and will take place in Aberdeen, Glasgow and Edinburgh. 

For more retails on the workshops and to register to attend please see below:

Scottish Government: National Approach to Advanced Practice

The Scottish Government has been working towards the development of a national approach to advanced practice, a key strand of the Transforming Nursing Roles programme. In addition, The Scottish Government’s Programme for Government includes the commitment to train 500 additional Advanced Nurse Practitioners (ANPs) by 2021. ANPs will be a crucial part of the Scottish Government’s aim to transform Primary Care and shift the balance of care from acute settings to the community. It is envisaged that many of these posts will be developed in community settings, including within the care sector.

National Approach to Advanced Practice

To reduce unwarranted variation in practice, a national approach to the ANP role has been agreed by the Transforming Nursing Roles Group and Scottish Executive Nurse Directors as outlined in the paper Transforming Nursing Roles: Developing Advanced Practice in NHS Scotland. NHS Boards are being asked to implement the recommendations within this report which apply to them. A key recommendation is that Boards undertake Service Needs Analyses (SNA) to help inform sustainable development of ANPs to meet the needs of patients. 

Members of the independent care sector are being asked to participate in this SNA in order to ultimately have access to Scottish Government funding to train ANPs. A sum of £500,000 has been set aside for 2017/18 for this purpose. Care homes will be able to access the funding for additional training if there is an identified need, so if you perceive this would be helpful to your organisation, please complete the following needs assessment form by July 31

https://response.questback.com/nhseducationforscotland/educationneedsanalysis2017

Any requests for an extension to this deadline, should be made to [email protected]