COVID-19 Primary Care bulletin

12 May 2020

COVID-19: today's round-up for primary care

Dear colleagues,

Today is International Nurses Day celebrated around the world every year. This year's theme is 'Nursing the World of Health'. We’d like to thank all nurses working in primary care for all you are doing during this time stepping up and leading with innovative solutions to keeping patients safe. Follow and join in using #InternationalNursesDay and #IND2020 on social media.

Yesterday, the UK Government published its COVID-19 recovery strategy. See the Dentistry and Optometry sections below for clarifications.

It’s Mental Health Awareness week this week, and we’d like to encourage all NHS staff to access the mental health and wellbeing support offers available to them.  More than 108,000 downloads of the free mental health self help apps have been made so far, showing just how important this type of support is to our NHS staff.  You can also access our free staff support line and the confidential bereavement line.  Please visit our website for more information or to download the apps.

Recognising that it is an incredibly tough time for many of us at the moment, we have put together a suite of bereavement resources that aim to help NHS staff access support during what will be a difficult time, given the restrictions and changes to normal grieving patterns and processes for staff who come from diverse backgrounds.  You can find a selection of resources that will support you during a bereavement, be that practical next steps to take as a line manager or confidential bereavement support staffed by a team of specialists.  You can access the bereavement support online or call the confidential bereavement support line, operated by Hospice UK, on 0300 303 4434, free to access from 8am – 8pm, seven days a week.

Nikki and Ed

General practice

An update on total triage and remote consultations

General practice has rapidly moved to triaging patient contacts and remote management of patients’ needs in response to COVID-19. In the last few weeks we have seen an amazing level of change in general practice from carrying out most work face-to-face, to now providing the majority of services to patients remotely.

To support total triage (remote total triage) and remote management, practice and commissioners were asked to have an online and video consultation system procured and live by 30 April 2020. With this date now in the past, we wanted to share with you how far we’ve come:

• Video consultations are now available in 97% of practices, covering 98% of the population. Prior to COVID-19 only 5% of practices were live with video consultations. By the end of March 2020, it was approximately 66%.
• Online consultations are available in 75% of practices, covering 77% of the population. Another 20% of practices are currently implementing an online consultation solution and we expect them to be live in the next couple of weeks. At the end of March less than 30% of practices were live with an online consultation system.

As you can see, from prior to COVID-19 starting until now, remarkable progress has been made. This has helped protect both patients and staff by reducing footfall and ensuring general practice remains open and available to anyone who needs it.

Thank you to all of you who have contributed to these efforts – these achievements would not have been possible without you. We understand that these remain challenging times, so want to reassure you that we are committed to continuing to support practices to optimise digital solutions and gain benefits for patients and for staff – contact your NHS England and NHS Improvement regional team or the NHSX Implementation Team for more information.

Digital support for care home providers

Work is ongoing across the NHS and social care sector to support social care providers and the lives of those they care for, during the COVID-19 pandemic. This includes:

• The rollout of NHSmail to over 8,000 care homes and over 2,500 domiciliary care providers; 
• Supporting remote consultations, and reducing social isolation and loneliness for care home residents by working with suppliers to provide tablet devices capable of secure video calling;
• Improving care home connectivity and WIFI access by negotiating a number of offers from telecomms providers; 
• Increased digital implementation support to care providers though the new Digital Social Care helpline;
• Increased access to up-to-date and accurate information for care professionals through the new Care workforce app and promotion of the care home capacity tracker.

Community pharmacy

Examples of good practice

The General Pharmaceutical Council has identified over 60 examples of how pharmacies are meeting their professional standards during the COVID-19 pandemic. Read the examples on the Knowledge Hub.

Dentistry

On 10 May 2020, the Prime Minister announced the conditional plan to ease restrictions.  All dental guidance and Standard Operating Procedures currently in force remain unchanged. The temporary cessation of routine dentistry addresses the safety of patients and of dental teams as well as supporting the public health measures required to slow community transmission of COVID-19.  This advice has not changed.

The most recent guidance letter and standard operating procedure for oral health professionals is available on our website.

Optometry

On 10 May 2020, the Prime Minister announced the conditional plan to ease restrictions.  All optical guidance remains unchanged. The temporary cessation of routine optical services addresses the safety of patients and of optical teams as well as supporting the public health measures required to slow community transmission of COVID-19.  This advice has not changed.

The most recent guidance letter for optical staff is available on our website.

Dates for your diary 

Wednesday 13 May 1-2pm - Digital Nurse Network, Webinar Thirteen will look at video consultations and network updates. Helen Crowther RN and Ann Gregory RN, Clinical Nurse Advisors at NHSX are joined by Alison Taylor RN who is leading on a project putting devices into care homes to allow residents to connect with their families during COVID19. We will also be discussing video consultations to manage Long Term Conditions and minor illnesses in primary care. Book to join online. Direct link to the LIVE webinar is here. Click 5 minutes before the session to join.

Wednesday 13 May 1.30-2.30pm - Starting out as a social prescribing link worker. This webinar aims to help new link workers understand the basics of their social prescribing link worker roles within PCNs.

Thursday 14 May 5-6pm GP webinar with Nikki and Ed

Thursday 14 May 8-9pm PCPA webinar: Managing COVID in Care Homes - Delivering Care

To catch up on previous primary care webinars visit Future NHS.

Nikki and Ed's link of the day

Highlighting the amazing work of practice nurses during COVID-19 and beyond The Power of Practice Nursing: the future of general practice nursing in London – part 1 is the first in the new ‘The Power of Practice Nursing – The Future of General Practice Nursing in London’ series, a collaborative project from Health Education England, the Healthy London Partnership and NHS England and NHS Improvement.