29 September 2020

Dear colleagues,

We do hope you can join us for our monthly General Practice webinar this Thursday at 5pm where we will be sharing information about the national flu programme including vaccination for those with a learning disability, general practice workforce and planning for COVID-19 wave two. Please do sign up to attend by 12 noon on 30 September 2020.

Nikki and Ed

COVID-19 guidance and updates

Convalescent plasma donation

NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) has had many coronavirus convalescent plasma donations from primary care colleagues who’ve had coronavirus. NHSBT is seeking further support over the autumn and winter. Colleagues are asked to donate and also act as advocates with the public. You can volunteer to donate here with visuals and posters for providers available here.

Remote monitoring webinar and tools now available

NHSX recently hosted two clinically led webinars on remote monitoring. The first from Dr Matthew Knight and Alex Newland-Smith, aimed at NHS Trust staff, introduced remote monitoring and covered the clinical pathway, patient trend patterns. It can be viewed here. In the second, GPs Tony Willis and Kuldhir Johal, shared their practice experiences and reviewed case examples. Aimed at primary and community care, you can view the recording here.

You can now procure remote monitoring tools on Spark. Remote monitoring, supported by local expertise, will allow citizens to receive safe, convenient and compassionate COVID care, or care for a long-term condition, outside of traditional clinical settings. The Spark Dynamic Purchasing System (DPS) offers NHS and social care organisations a fast, easy and secure way to procure remote monitoring tools and technologies.

iPads to help care homes provide continued care to residents  

To ensure that all care home residents in England have equality in access to video consultations and remote care, NHSX is providing tablet devices to care homes and helping them to improve their internet access. The tablet will also allow staff to access NHSmail, other tools or systems needed to support care as well as to connect care home residents with loved ones and access. This offer is one element of a package of support for care homes ahead of winter. Care homes must apply for a tablet before 23 October 2020. Find out more about eligibility and apply.  

JCVI advice on priority groups for covid-19 vaccine

The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI)  has published updated advice on the priority groups to receive COVID-19 vaccine. The committee has advised that vaccine should first be given to care home residents and staff, followed by people over 80 and health and social workers, then to the rest of the population in order of age and risk. This advice will continue to be updated as more information is available on vaccine effectiveness, safety and clinical characteristics.

General practice

Primary care networks: delivering a digital response to the pandemic, and beyond

Colleagues working across primary care networks have come together to discuss the collaboration that has been happening to implement the delivery of care and support access to general practice services via digital channels, alongside traditional routes. We hear how local relationships have been used to build virtual hubs where remote consultations can be managed centrally across a group of practices or PCNs. Other benefits include the sharing of workforce, resources and workload, alongside ensuring a greater resilience when demand is high or providing much needed support following loss of capacity. Listen to the podcast here.

Network DES 2020/21 service requirements and supporting guidance

On 17 September we published an updated Network Contract DES Specification, Network Contract DES Guidance and Investment and Impact Fund implementation guidance. The changes were summarised in our covering letter. These changes supplement existing guidance on Enhanced Health in Care Homes and Early Cancer Diagnosis service to support primary care networks with delivery of the DES service requirements.

These three delayed Primary Care Network Directed Enhanced Service (DES) service requirements apply from 1 October. Guidance is available on our website:

• Structured Medication Reviews (SMRs) and Medicines Optimisation
• Early Cancer Diagnosis
• Enhanced Health in Care Homes

FAQs are available but should you have any additional questions, please contact our GP Contracts team via email england.gpcontracts@nhs.net.

NHS Confederation’s PCN Network resources

The NHS Confederation’s PCN Network has produced a number of resources and good practice that may be useful for PCNs. These include:

• a briefing on the updated Network DES
• some guidance on the new Care Homes Clinical Lead
• Pharmacy’s role in primary care network multidisciplinary teams supporting care homes
• Delivering the early diagnosis of cancer PCN specification
• Delivering the early diagnosis of cancer PCN specification: top tip on learning event audits and top ten tips

Community pharmacy

Alignment of business continuity plans to support local community pharmacies

It is recognised that the temporary closure of an individual pharmacy and/or general practice can impact on the other pharmacies and general practices within a primary care network (PCN). Community pharmacy and their pharmacy PCN leads have been proactively incentivised via the Pharmacy Quality Scheme to have business continuity plans in place in anticipation of any temporary closures. We’re asking GP practices and PCNs to support their local community pharmacies by aligning business continuity plans in the event of a closure. Further details of this criterion can be found in section 7.2 here.

Dentistry

Sign up: NHS dentistry and oral health bulletin

This October, we are launching a new NHS dentistry and oral health bulletin, which will include a roundup of all the latest news and important resources for anyone working in NHS dental services. We will still share important content in this bulletin. Sign up here.

Additional information

Chief People Officer bulletin

Subscribe to the Chief People Officer bulletin to get the latest updates on the NHS People Plan, including looking after our people – retention, health and wellbeing, improving leadership culture and the very best of #OurNHSPeople. Please share with your colleagues and networks within the system to encourage them to sign up, specifically chief executives, accountable officers, human resources directors and other senior leaders.

A further step toward an alternative route into nursing

Health Education England’s (HEE) Blended Learning Nursing Degree, an innovative national programme to train nurses of the future, has moved to the next stage.

Using a mix of technologies to study with important practice experience, this degree will provide opportunities to more people who have the right aptitude and values but need to study flexibly, pursue a career in nursing.

At a collaborative event last week/month [25/9/2020] a partnership of seven universities, HEE and others discussed the next steps to delivery of the programme, while beginning to build a network for knowledge sharing and best practice.

Universities are working towards the first students starting their courses from early 2021.

Dates for your diary

Wednesday 30 September, 12pm - 1:30pm. Musculoskeletal (MSK) First Contact Physiotherapists: webinar and Q&A session.  This webinar will explore the findings of the FCP national evaluation and highlight the roles key system partners will play in supporting systems to deliver a safe FCP service that is integrated across the MSK framework.  

Wednesday 30 September, 4pm - 5pm. Digital Primary Care - Flu Campaign 2020

Wednesday 30 September, 10am - 12pm. New PCN health and wellbeing coaches webinar.

Thursday 1 October, 11am - 12pm. NHS Volunteer Responder programme - webinar

 Thursday 1 October, 4pm - 5pm. Maximising your money – hints, tips and tools for all NHS staff

Thursday 1 October 2020, 5 – 6:30pm: General Practice webinar

The next General Practice webinar with Nikki Kanani and Ed Waller will include a focus on the national flu programme. This is a closed webinar for those working in or with general practice. To attend please ensure you register by 12 noon on 30 September 2020.

Thursday 8 October, 12pm - 1:30pm. New PCN care coordinators webinar

 8 - 9 October. UK Annual Social Prescribing Link Worker Day Awards and Conference. A virtual awards ceremony and conference is set to mark the day.

Tuesday 13 October, 11am – 12pm. Building back from COVID-19: Involving citizens in the next phase of pandemic response

This webinar will look at ‘dialogue and deliberation’ as a crucial way to support recovery planning and ICS development. Focusing on an example of ‘deliberative engagement’ used across London to engage residents to help shape policy, this webinar will focus on why citizen engagement is crucial to Covid-19 recovery and how ICSs could benefit from adopting the same approach. Speakers include:

• Mike Cooke, North Central London Integrated Care System [CHAIR]
• Vin Diwakar, Medical Director, London Region
• Amy Darlington, Imperial College Health Partners
• Michelle Mackie, Ipsos Mori

12 – 13 November. PCRMM Virtual Conference 2020

Link of the day

Language Matters Diabetes is a global movement that discusses the language we use when dealing with different types of Diabetes.