NHSGGC promotes good mental health and the wellbeing of our staff. We treat our people fairly regardless of their mental health status and we don’t discriminate. We also provide a safe and healthy workplace.
Mental health problems like stress, depression or anxiety cause a significant proportion of sickness absence across Scotland. We know that getting support at an early stage can prevent absence from work and help recovery.
To achieve this, our staff will be managed in a way that is not detrimental to their mental health and positively promotes mental health and wellbeing, following our policies in this area.
Top Tips
Mental health problems are a common cause of long term sickness absence and have major resource implications for NHSGGC. Promoting positive mental health and wellbeing helps improve physical health, social inclusion and productivity
NHSGGC has a duty of care under our Staff Governance Standard to protect the mental health and wellbeing of our staff whilst they are at work. We are also committed to tackling disability discrimination, including discrimination relating to people who experience mental health problems.
Beyond our legal obligations, we promote good mental health and wellbeing by providing healthy working environments to help develop and nurture staff.
Policy
NHSGGC aim to promote and protect the mental health and wellbeing of staff. A range of policies and practices exist to help us do this and this policy guidance brings these together for easy reference: Board Mental Health and Wellbeing Policy.
The NHS Scotland Workforce Attendance Policy came into effect on the 1st March 2020. This policy aims to encourage and support employee attendance, where health impacts their ability to be at work.
The aim of Attendance Management is to help the Board make the most of the employee attendance by reducing both short and long-term absence through promoting positive attitudes to work and effectively working in partnerships with all parties to reduce employee absence to the minimum levels as possible. This policy ensures that NHSGGC adopt a fair, consistent and supportive approach to staff with health problems, resolving long term or on-going absences through the most appropriate means available and ensuring they provide a healthy and safe workplace.
COVID Special Leave will end on Sunday 31st March 2024. Therefore, from 1st April 2024 any employee absent due to COVID symptoms will be recorded as sick leave. Please see DL(2024)03 – Removal of Temporary COVID Special Leave for further information.
The introduction of the Workplace Adjustment Passport aims to support employees with a disability, health condition or diversity in the workplace to have a great experience at work. This can be used to support employees within their current workplace or when moving between departments and / or roles. This is in accordance with the Equality Act 2010.
Further guidance on attendance management specific to staff working in Glasgow City HSCP can be found here.
NHSGGC Menopause Policy
NHSGGC is committed to ensuring the health, safety and wellbeing of our employees and ensuring everyone is treated with dignity and respect.
The menopause is a natural process and for many can be positively managed through lifestyle adjustments. However, NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde recognises that for some the menopause is not always an easy transition. Some employees may need additional considerations to support and improve their experience at work.
NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is committed to supporting employees who are affected in any way by the menopause and to support and inform managers so that employees reporting issues are treated fairly and given appropriate support.
Following long term absence the arrangements are that an employee who returns to work on a phased return as recommended by Occupational Health will be entitled to be paid for a period of up to 4 weeks at their normal contractual pay.
If the phased return needs to extend beyond 4 weeks, the employee will be expected to contribute any accrued annual leave. However, if an employee does not wish to use their annual leave they can opt to be paid according to the actual hours worked during the phased return period.
Phased returns should not normally last for periods of longer than 8 weeks.
NHSGGC have a zero tolerance approach to smoking on all NHS grounds and premises. NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde is committed to providing a safe and healthy environment for all staff, patients and visitors.
Our Smokefree Policy aims to work towards a tobacco-free environment. This policy applies to all staff, patients and visitors.
This course is designed to help our senior managers to promote and achieve the highest ED&I standards and getting the best performance from their teams by valuing the diversity across the workforce.
It aims to ensure a consistent understanding about how best to lead teams in a way that respects diversity, promotes an inclusive workplace and treats all staff equitably by Integrating EDI into a broader people centred approach to people management.
Course Provider: Learning and Education in partnership with City of Glasgow College
Duration; 3.5 hours
Method of Delivery; Hybrid- mix of In person and Online (MS Teams)
Who should attend
Any senior manager (Band 7 and above) in NHSGGC who has responsibility for managing NHSGGC staff in their teams. This includes managers employed in integrated Health and Social Care Partnerships who are not directly employed by NHSGGC.
Pre-requisites
Familiarity with the following resources will be useful:
If you need any information on specific course content or booking process, please do not hesitate to contact Learning and Education Support Service on 0141 278 2700 (Option 3).
Last updated; 8/11/2024
Course Overview
This course is designed to help our people managers to promote and achieve the highest ED&I standards and getting the best performance from their teams by valuing diversity across the workforce.
It aims to ensure a consistent understanding across all current managers about:
• How best to manage teams in a way that respects diversity, promotes an inclusive workplace and treats staff equitably
• How to Integrate ED&I into a broader people centred approach to people management, and also
• Some of the key supports, policies and processes that managers can draw on and apply to enable that approach.
Course Provider: Learning and Education in partnership with City of Glasgow College
Duration; 3 hours
Method of Delivery; Online (MS Teams)
Who should attend
Any middle manager (up to Band 6) in NHSGGC who has responsibility for managing NHSGGC staff in their teams. This includes managers employed in integrated Health and Social Care Partnerships who are not directly employed by NHSGGC.
Pre-requisites
Familiarity with the following resources will be useful:
If you need any information on specific course content or booking process, please do not hesitate to contact Learning and Education Support Service on 0141 278 2700 (Option 3).
Last updated; 06/11/2024
Course overview
Supporting staff is a key part of the manager’s job and this module offers guidance and support on issues relating to harassment at work. The main aspects of addressing harassment concerns including roles and responsibilities, policy framework and sources of advice and support will be covered.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of this module delegates will be able to:
Demonstrate an understanding of the Bullying and Harassment policy, and more specifically Sexual Harassment.
Create a safe and inclusive environment where everyone feels valued and respected.
Recognise responsibilities in line with organisational and NHS Scotland’s values to ensure everyone is treated with dignity and respect.
Be able to carry out the manager’s role to address harassment in the workplace at the earliest opportunity.
Awareness of the range of actions and support available.
Know how to access information resources, support and advice.
To describe best practice and ensure it happens.
To share knowledge of formal and informal approaches/interventions.
Who should attend?
Any manager in NHSGGC who has responsibility for managing NHSGGC staff in their teams. This includes managers employed in integrated Health and Social Care Partnerships who are not directly employed by NHSGGC.
KSF Links
C1 – Communication
C2 – Personal and People Development
C3 – Health, Safety and Security
C6 – Equality and Diversity
HWB1 – Promotion of Health and Wellbeing
Course Provider: Human Resources and Learning and Education Duration: 1 hour Webinar via MS Teams
Pre-requisites and other supporting resources
All potential candidates should explore the followings:
If you need any information on specific course content, the venue or booking process, please do not hesitate to contact Learning and Education Support Team on 0141 278 2700 (Option 3).
Last updated: 16/03/2025
The electronic Employee Support System (eESS) was introduced in 2018 meaning a fundamental change to working practices, with the introduction of the Manager Self Service function.
All Line Managers (Band 6 or above) will have access to eESS Manager Self Service and will be responsible for approving/declining any requests submitted by employees. Line Managers will also be able to process payroll transactions for staff for changes in employment.
eESS Managers – Going on leave?
If you are going on leave and want to nominate a colleague to manage transactions in your absence you can set this up in Vacation Rules on your home screen (see SOP238 for further details). Please ensure you nominate a colleague in adherence with your Board’s policies and Standing Financial Instructions (e.g. in some Boards this may be a minimum of Band 7 and within the same business unit).
If you want to grant another user access to manage your Worklist in your absence (see SOP239 for further details). This functionality is used to give another eESS user access to your Worklist. The user can manage your Worklist on your behalf
Fixed Term Contract extensions – If an employee’s fixed term contract is to be extended, please contact the eESS Support Team via the HR Connect Portal for this to be updated on the employee’s record, confirming the new date the contract is to be extended to (together with the employee Name and eESS ID)
Change of Contract Details – If an employee’s contracted hours or contract type is changing, ie. fixed term to permanent, please contact the eESS Support Team via the HR Connect Portal for this to be updated on the employee’s record, confirming the date the contract is changing (together with the employee Name and eESS ID)
Managers should also contact Payroll Officer for any changes being put through that have an impact on salary ( i.e. increasing/decreasing hours/band/terminations/annex 21 etc.) to save any under/over-payments being made
The eESS Manager Self Service section below shows some other examples of what Managers can do (role dependent):
It is important that you complete the appropriate eESS transaction as soon as you become aware that a staff member is leaving (for example, when you are given notice of their plan to leave). This ensures the staff member is terminated on the correct date and that there are no salary overpayments.
In line with local arrangements there may be requirements to setup Proxy Users across NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde (NHSGGC) for Manager Self Service.
A proxy user is someone who will transact self-service functions on behalf of:
a line manager; or
peer employees
via self-service-based access.
Please refer to the Proxy User Briefing document which outlines the process and details the governance rules associated with Proxy Users. The document can be found on the HR Connect Portal. Completed forms should be returned via the portal.
If you have previously logged on to your account and have forgotten your password you can reset it using the “Forgotten your Password?” link on the sign in page.
This quick guide gives information on the process for new staff. If you are a new user and you don’t have a username or password, please speak to your line manager who will contact Learning and Education to get you added to their TURAS Appraisal managers page and request a username and password for you. This will be issued by Learning and Education, direct to you, by e-mail.
I don’t see TURAS Appraisal when I login to my TURAS Account – why not?
You can’t add TURAS Appraisal into an existing TURAS account yourself. If you contact the Learning and Education Support Team via NHS Service Now or call 0141 278 2700 option 3 they will provide login details for your TURAS Appraisal account. You can continue with separate login details for your different TURAS applications or L&E Support will advise how you can get the National Digital Team to merge your accounts so that you have the one login for all TURAS applications.
Not all the staff are listed on my managers page that should be. How do I add staff?
To add staff to your Turas Appraisal account please complete the Staff List Template and send this to Learning and Education Support Unit via NHS Service Now.
The form has to be completed by the manager/PA only, not the staff member. Only new or missing staff are to be added to the form, existing staff members should not be put on.
I need to allocate some of the staff on my managers page to other people in my team to carry out their review – how do I do this?
I’ve Retired and Returned and my TURAS Appraisal has all changed – what do I do?
The information relating to your previous posts is still visible to you however if you had staff assigned to you this will need to be updated. This quick guide gives information on what you need to do.
How can I access my teams progress reports to check compliance?
TURAS Appraisal now has live Team Progress Dashboards. Both managers and reviewers will be able to view live information for the staff that they have assigned to them on TURAS Appraisal including the compliance percentage of signed off reviews, status of reviews, information on PDPs, objectives and also a to do list where there are outstanding actions. Users guides below:
The form has to be completed by the manager/PA only, not the staff member
Only new or missing staff are to be added to the form, existing staff members should not be put on.
To remove staff from your TURAS Appraisal Account:
If the member of staff is leaving NHSGGC completely – No action is required. Once terminated from the Payroll system they will automatically be deleted from TURAS Appraisal
If the member of staff is moving to another department – contact the Learning and Education Support Team via NHS Service Now providing the name and payroll number of the member of staff to be removed
Assigning reviewer rights to members of staff that you want to review members of your team:
At this time only the Learning and Education Support Team can assign reviewer rights. To arrange this the manager of the person that reviewer rights is required for should contact the Learning and Education Support Team via NHS Service Now. Please provide name and payroll number of the person that reviewer rights is to be assigned to.
Assigning a reviewer and assigning/changing a KSF Post Outline for staff:
Reports are available from the Team Progress Dashboard on your TURAS Appraisal account. If you have manager or Reviewer access to the system and have staff assigned to your account you will automatically have access to the dashboard.
The Team Progress report will give you live information on compliance rate for your team with regards to reviews, PDPs and objectives. It also has a to do list to alert you if any actions are required.
This link will provide you with information on all KSF post outlines for NHSGGC staff. You will be able to view the title, pay band, all dimensions and levels included in the KSF post outline.
It does not included the level descriptions but you will find these in the documents below and also in the KSF handbook.
Occasionally there may be a KSF Post Outline on the spreadsheet that will not be on TURAS Appraisal. This is because on the day e-KSF was decommissioned the KSF Post Outline was not assigned to any members of staff, only KSF Post Outlines in use were migrated to TURAS Appraisal.
NHS Service Now Portal – Click on the L&E Icon and fill in the relevant fields. You will receive an acknowledgement which will include a ticket number for your query. How to raise a query through NHS Service Now Portal.
0141 278 2700 (12700 internally) – choose option 3 for Learning and Education. Open 10.00am – 3.00pm, Monday to Friday
Please supply your GGC payroll number when you contact the team.
This year the Chair, Dr Lesley Thomson KC, presented two Chair’s Awards of Excellence which recognise outstanding achievement, expertise and dedication in patient care. As with all our awards, they celebrate the incredible efforts of our wonderful staff.
The Celebrating Success Event was held on 30th May 2024.
The winners were announced live on the night on our social media channels (follow the #ggcawards tag).
You can find out who the winners were and also view their photos and videos below.
Congratulations to all our winners!
Dr Mike Basler and his Team
Dr Mike Basler is a Consultant Anaesthetist at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary. Since 2017, Dr Basler has helped provide anaesthetic care to patients in Ghana as part of project, Resurge Africa, while organising and leading burns, resuscitation, and regional anaesthesia courses for the local staff.
This year was Dr Basler’s last trip as an NHS consultant before he retires and he pulled together a larger team of anaesthetic consultants and trainees to provide a more ambitious programme of teaching along with anaesthetic support in theatre.
Dr Basler has worked tirelessly for many years on this project and provided high quality clinical care in challenging circumstances, always with an infectious level of enthusiasm.
He has also made it his goal to ensure a sustainable relationship between the Glasgow and Accra anaesthetics departments so that these training and clinical care initiatives can continue successfully after his retirement.
Teenage and Young Adult Cancer Team
The Teenage and Young Adult Cancer Team is based in the Beatson West of Scotland Cancer Care. The team provides outstanding support for their patients and their families during a highly stressful time in their lives.
This included enabling young people to get together with others of a similar age who are also going through a cancer journey.
When an annual and much-loved charity peer-to-peer support event fell through in 2023, this team stepped in to arrange, organise, facilitate, and support a group of young people from all over Scotland to attend a weekend-long event at an outward-bound centre instead. It was a great success and a trip to remember for everyone involved.
The William Cullen Prize for Excellence In Teaching and the William Cullen Prize for Service Innovation are awarded in collaboration with the Royal College of Physicians in Edinburgh.
The Celebrating Success Event was held on 30th May 2024.
The winners were announced live on the night on our social media channels (follow the #ggcawards tag).
You can find out who the winners were and also view their photos and videos below.
Congratulations to all our winners!
William Cullen Prize for Innovation – Joint Winners
The leadership of Professor Keith Muir and Dr Wazim Izzath has been crucial in moving forward a very challenging, and time critical treatment paradigm and this award recognises the hard work moving this treatment pathway over the past 4 years. Stroke is one of Glasgow’s ‘big three’ killers alongside cancer and heart disease and over the past 18 months stroke thrombectomy has developed on the QEUH site.
The Stroke service initially starting as a test of change, broadening to a service for local Queen Elizabeth patients and in the past month has moved forward for a service for the West of Scotland. The service development has been transformative for those patients with life threatening severe stroke. It would not have been possible without the commitment of multiple teams involved including ED, Stroke, neuro-anaesthetics and diagnostic and interventional neuroradiology.
As part of the Realistic Medicine work programme in NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde, Judith Roulston has developed and implemented Treatment Escalation Plans (TEPs) in the Beatson in-patient service. This area of work has contributed to reducing inter-hospital critical care transfers, improved communications by both patients and staff, and has promoted patient centred shared decision making in Oncology services.
This innovation is particularly evident in the Beatson Enhanced Care Unit where there is a focus on all patients having a TEP in place and ongoing discussions to support their wishes. Judith works with a wider team within the Beatson Centre and across NHSGGC to enable staff to have confidence and competence to have the necessary realistic conversations with patients.
William Cullen Prize for Education – Dr Lucy Carrick
This year’s William Cullen Prize for Education is Dr Lucy Carrick.
Dr Carrick is a Consultant Psychiatrist and Clinical Director in Gartnavel Royal Hospital. The psychiatry team at Gartnavel Royal Hospital train foundation, core and specialist trainees, and the responses in the Scottish Trainee Survey from 2023 demonstrate how much the unit values its trainees.
This award is a reflection on the hard work of the Educational and Clinical Supervisors as well as the administration and operations team who have worked hard to provide a positive training experience.
At a time when we are looking to support foundation training in Greater Glasgow and Clyde, the feedback from Foundation trainees was particularly gratifying in terms of key aspects such as handover, induction and the educational environment and is an indication of the focus on improving training and clinical care within the department.
The eESS Self-Service module will be a fundamental change to working practices for employees.
eESS Employee Self Service
Employees will now have access to view and update the following information:
Please note – All Personal Sensitive Information is held securely within eESS. Any updates or changes to this type of information is held in confidence, and will not be notified to your manager, HR or anyone else using the system.
Equality and diversity information – age, gender, religion etc – Please check/update. You can do so by following Change Personal Information – NHS Scotland eESS. This enables us to continuously improve as an equal opportunities employer. It ensures the right resources, facilities and support are available for you. Further information can be found at Employee Equality Data – NHSGGC
Full access to all Employee Self Service Standard Operating Procedures and eLearning video’s is available via the eESS National website
Our dedicated teams and individuals were nominated for the prestigious NHSGGC Excellence Awards by patients, visitors and staff. All of our staff have gone above and beyond in the past year and we asked to hear about your experience of outstanding care and for your nominations.
There are 7 categories in our Excellence Awards and the winners were announced at the Celebrating Success Event on 30th May 2024.
The winners were announced live on the night on our social media channels (follow the #ggcawards tag).
You can find out who the Gold Winners were, read about the Silver Winners who were shortlisted, and also view photos and videos in each of the categories below.
Congratulations to all our winners!
Better Care
This award recognises staff who provide and contribute towards incredible patient care improving everyday practices across NHSGGC.
Gold Winner – Transoral Robotic Surgery
The Transoral Robotic Service (TORS) was set up at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in 2022. It provides a minimally invasive option for patients which results in a reduced length of hospital stay, quicker recovery and a reduced functional impact on swallowing. In addition, it can provide a therapeutic surgical option to patients with early-stage oropharyngeal cancers.
In the first year, the team treated 25 patients, and this doubled to 50 patients in 2023. They are now working on establishing a regional service to provide TORS for other patients in Scotland.
This means that within 2 years, the Glasgow TORS team has become the 3rd largest provider of TORS in the United Kingdom and the only therapeutic centre in Scotland.
Well done to the team for their outstanding work in delivering patient centred care.
Silver Winners
The Teenage and Young Adult Cancer Team
Based in the Beatson West of Scotland Cancer Care, the Teenage and Young Adult Cancer Team has been nominated due to the outstanding support they have given to patients and their families during a highly stressful time in their lives.
This included enabling young people to get together with others of a similar age who are also going through a cancer journey.
When an annual and much-loved charity peer-to-peer support event fell through in 2023, the team stepped in to organise a weekend-long event at an outward-bound centre instead, arranging for a group of young people from all over Scotland to attend and giving them the support they needed. It was a great success and a trip to remember for everyone involved.
The teens’ feedback said it all. They said:
“It was honestly the most amazing weekend, and I am missing being away already. This will be a weekend that will be spoken about for a long time to come.”
“This is the best thing I’ve ever done! I’ve been to another residential and this was by far the best. We were really lucky to have such a great group and I now have friends that I didn’t know I needed.”
Dr Ann-Margaret Little, Histocompatibility and Immunogenetics Team
The wait for a new kidney is a long, stressful experience for patients – and if someone is unfortunate to have developed antibodies in the blood that means they would be at risk of early severe rejection, that wait could be even longer.
Dr Little wanted to change that – she wanted to use new technology and the expertise of her team within the Histocompatibility and Immunogenetics (H&I) Laboratory to analyse the profile of these different antibodies in individual patients and use that information to identify more potentially compatible kidneys and reduce the risk of rejection.
As a result of this work, the strategy is now embedded in the process for all kidney transplant candidates in Scotland and probably more than 100 patients including children have received a kidney transplant who might not have otherwise.
Falling Stars Initiative, Cuthbertson Ward
The falling stars initiative was introduced to reduce the number of falls on an older adult dementia assessment ward by 30%.
The team introduced several measures including a traffic light mobility chart to provide information on falls risk for each person on their bedroom door.
Additionally, prompt cards were introduced to provide information highlighting fall risks and preventative measures including information relating to activities/behaviour, considerations and distraction techniques that could result in a fall. The project also aimed to improve staff awareness and knowledge on falls prevention and management.
In the six months prior to implementing the initiatives, the ward had 133 falls. In the six months following this, the ward saw falls reduce by 32% to record 90 falls within the same period – a great achievement.
Dr Claire Patterson
Dr Claire Paterson has been influential in improving cancer care and outcomes for head and neck cancer in the West of Scotland.
Dr Paterson undertakes the Head and Neck Oncology Team leadership role while organising regular update meetings for staff and has improved recruitment results in this area.
Claire regularly goes above and beyond the day-to-day clinical work and drives optimal clinical care and service by improving research, she regularly implements changes in practice while being aware of the need to audit, reflect and publish.
Thanks to her, the team keep up to date with evidence-based head and neck cancer management and our patients have access and support to be involved in clinical trials.
Better Health
This award commends staff who have implemented an initiative to improve the health and wellbeing of patients, the public and/or staff.
Gold Winner – Meander For Mental Health
Meander for Mental Health came from the Design in the Dale project led by the physiotherapy team at Leverndale Hospital, with the aim of promoting walking as a way of managing mental health, to reduce the stigma of mental illness and to bring the hospital and its local community together.
The project has grown over the past four years and now has two other events, Mambo for Mental Health and Pedal for Progress, and the group continues to lead on promoting physical activity across the site and opening opportunities that benefit the hospital and its local community.
Three main walking routes in and around the hospital are used by the team and each of the events organised has seen more than 150 participants from the hospital and local community, and the team have been able to use feedback from participants to shape their upcoming events, with each building on the successes of those that have gone before.
Silver Winners
The Mobile Global Health Clinic
The Forensic Community Health and Learning Disability Teams look after adults aged 18-65 with severe and enduring mental health problems and who have a history of serious offending, across Greater Glasgow and Clyde.
The teams of nurses had an aim of increasing uptake of and engagement with annual physical health checks and screening through Global Health Clinics, which provide person-centred packages of care to help reduce health inequalities.
During the Covid pandemic, the teams found many patients were willing to have the clinic at their home, and as a result they saw engagement rise to 81% in 2022, compared with only 11% when the clinics first started in 2014. The number of patients engaging with the service has increased each year.
These clinics allow onward referrals to be made to primary care and national screening programmes, improving patient care and helping to tackle health inequalities.
Specialist Treatment for Addressing Risk (STAR) Service
The Directorate of Forensic Mental Health and Learning Disability offers care and support for patients experiencing a range of learning disabilities and mental disorders. However, there are some patients whose condition means that they pose a high risk to those around them.
STAR is a team that offers highly specialised care for these people, delivered by a dedicated team of Clinical Psychologists. Working alongside other disciplines within the directorate, as well as healthcare professionals outside NHSGGC, criminal justice social workers and law enforcement officers, the team provides individualised care tailored to every patient’s needs.
This approach increases the likelihood of successful outcomes by reducing reoffending rates, improving mental health of service users, and enhancing their overall well-being. And in turn, it contributes to an overall sense of safer neighbourhoods and community cohesion.
Meander For Mental Health
Meander for Mental Health came from the Design in the Dale project led by the physiotherapy team at Leverndale Hospital, with the aim of promoting walking as a way of managing mental health, to reduce the stigma of mental illness and to bring the hospital and its local community together.
The project has grown over the past four years and now has two other events, Mambo for Mental Health and Pedal for Progress, and the group continues to lead on promoting physical activity across the site and opening opportunities that benefit the hospital and its local community.
Three main walking routes in and around the hospital are used by the team and each of the events organised has seen more than 150 participants from the hospital and local community, and the team have been able to use feedback from participants to shape their upcoming events, with each building on the successes of those that have gone before.
Better Value
This award is for staff who have increased efficiencies taking a new approach to work making better use of resources.
Gold Joint Winners – Digital Psychological Therapies and the Staffbank Service Team
Reconfiguring some psychological therapy services became a significant challenge due to Covid-19 and long waiting times, but the creation of a centralised team, delivering psychological therapies digitally via the NHS Near Me/Attend Anywhere system has transformed how services are delivered.
Since June 2023, when the team went live, they have been able to establish systems and processes which allows them to work flexibly across multiple teams with long waiting time pressures.
By embracing digital technology, the service has been able to deliver measurable benefits in terms of improving treating the number of people waiting over the 18-week national standard.
It is also making this way of delivering this type of service to appropriate patients more mainstream, allowing local teams to focus on patients who require their therapy delivered face-to-face in clinical settings.
While using the new model, the team continue to monitor, refine and streamline their processes to ensure they deliver a service which benefits patients.
The sheer diversity and large number of staffing requests to ensure services continue to deliver healthcare makes the Staffbank Service worthy of recognition. Any requests to support services always turn to the Bank Team, who are the largest in the country, and deal with around 10,000 shifts per week being booked via the bank office.
The team have provided a rapid and efficient response to mass recruitment needs, with more than 4,000 Healthcare Support Workers on boarded and hundreds cross-trained and reducing reliance on the use of agency staff in some services.
As well as this, the service was approached by the Public Health Vaccination Programme to support the training of vaccinators and also provided major staffing support to ensure that the schools immunisation programme could proceed.
Overall, the team have provided a vital service in challenging circumstances, ensuring that the needs of patients and service delivery are met in the most appropriate ways, ensuring continuity of care.
Silver Winners
Karen Thomson, Consultant Sonographer
Karen joined the Diagnostic Imaging team in February 2023 as a Consultant Sonographer. At the time, the service was still recovering from the pandemic, and waits for Ultrasounds were still longer than the team would have hoped for. However, in barely a year, Karen has been instrumental in reducing this waiting list significantly, cutting the longest waits by more than half.
In addition, she has completed an in-depth service review and implemented a focused strategic plan by upskilling Sonographers in examinations, allowing for more complex scans to be undertaken by a wider group of Sonographers.
Karen’s knowledge, skills and experience along with her approachable bubbly personality leadership style has built a strong team dynamic and that, along with her patient-focused approach, has been integral to improving the waiting list and patient outcomes.
Better Workplace
This award recognises the often unseen work of our staff who help make NHSGGC a better workplace, improving the culture and supporting colleagues.
Gold Winner – Acute Services Professional Administration Transformation Programme
The Acute Services Professional Administration Transformation Programme was set up in 2018 to recognise the central role that administrative services play in supporting patient-centred care, and to ensure the Board’s patient administrative services were operating efficiently and effectively. Last year it was refreshed to highlight administration as a professional career role within Acute Services.
The team has embraced partnership working and new technologies with the aim of creating a better workplace. At the outset, they delivered more than 72 roadshows to communicate and engage with staff. The programme has improved training and development opportunities for clinical administration staff and helped them harmonise ways of working and management arrangements.
This has included the Smarter Ways of Working Project, which utilises technologies to maximise support and make administrative staff more productive, as well as the development of an Appointment Planners pilot for Cardiology and Paediatric Surgery.
Silver Winners
Staff Hardship Fund
The Staff Hardship Fund was set up by the Support and Information Service to help mitigate the impact of the cost-of-living crisis on NHSGGC staff by offering a compassionate response to short-term financial difficulties, as part of our Staff Health Strategy action plan 2023/24.
Small grants of up to £100 are distributed to staff who are experiencing financial hardship. These grants are one-off payments are staff are not required to repay them. The fund also provides wrap-around support as part of the application process, with support offered from our in-house trained SIS advisors.
Staff can be further referred to our Financial Inclusion Partnership Services, where they can get access to financial advice and further grants and, if need be, benefits advice.
The fund can be accessed via self-referral by staff, Human Resources, staff-side representatives or Occupational Health, and staff are supported in a holistic and compassionate manner.
By end of December 2023 the fund had made 440 awards and provided staff with £43,770 worth of grants. Almost half of the staff referred to the fund have had onward referral or other support, such as our Money Advice Service or Home Energy Scotland.
INS Violence Reduction Team SLWG
Across NHSGGC, the safety and well-being of our staff is paramount, but in some areas, the nature of the job and the needs of the patients can bring additional risk and stress. The INS is one of these areas, and the Violence Reduction Group (SLWG) was set up to improve the well-being of staff who are regularly involved with providing care to patients who, due to brain injury, are frequently aggressive and physically violent towards staff.
Over a period of 3 months, the group looked at a range of issues and developed as range of measures to support staff. The model was then piloted on Ward 67, before going live across the Institute earlier this year.
While the reality of working with brain-injured patients mean the physical risk faced by staff will remain, by investing time in staff, and coming up with practical, workable measures to help them feel supported, the Team has helped staff feel more valued and listened to, reducing the anxiety that could lead to sickness absence through stress.
Global Citizenship
This award recognises staff who have travelled overseas to provide healthcare and/or education in developing countries or countries in crisis.
Gold Winner – Ceilidh Dunn
Ceilidh is a paediatric cardiac physiologist, specialising in congenital heart conditions. Day-to-day she is part of the paediatric cardiac team at the Royal Hospital for Children, but in her spare time she has gone to great lengths to help children with undiagnosed heart conditions in Gambia.
In December 2023, she used her own annual leave to fly out to the African country, for the second year in a row, to set up diagnostic services in paediatric cardiology in the Edward Francis Small Teaching hospital, situated in the capital Banjul.
Using Echo machines, donated by health boards in the UK, she and other clinicians spent their time seeing patients and training local staff in the use of the machines and other diagnostic techniques.
The hospital in Banjul now has a thriving diagnostic service thanks in no small part to Ceilidh’s efforts, and in addition to the contribution she makes at the RHC, it is wonderful to see one of our staff having such a global impact.
Silver Winners
Janet Litherland and Jane McNaughton
This project was organised by the charity Medical Aid for Palestine, which has been implementing heath development projects in the region for 25 years.
Consultant Radiologist Janet Litherland and Clinical Specialist Radiographer Jane McNaughton, both based at the West of Scotland Breast Screening Service, arranged for Palestinian mammographers and technicians to improve local diagnostic practices, and provided training to local healthcare professionals.
They arranged shadowing agreements for Palestinian consultants to see how clinics operate in NHSGGC, and also travelled to the region to provide invaluable clinical support and advice regarding current practice as used in the UK.
As a result of their efforts, MAP was able to run 39 missions to the West bank, Gaza and Lebanon. As well as this, a total of 82 volunteers donated 815 volunteer days to the missions, at an estimated value of more than £250,000, greatly improving local breast care services in the region.
Dr Mike Basler
Since 2017, Dr Basler, Consultant Anaesthetist at the Glasgow Royal Infirmary, has helped provide anaesthetic care to patients in Ghana, while organising and leading burns, resuscitation, and regional anaesthesia courses for local staff.
This year was Dr Basler’s last trip as an NHS consultant before he retires, and he pulled together a larger team of anaesthetic consultants and trainees to provide a more ambitious programme of teaching along with anaesthetic support in theatre.
Dr Basler has worked for many years on this project and provided high-quality clinical care in challenging circumstances, always with an infectious level of enthusiasm.
He has also made it his goal to ensure a sustainable relationship between anaesthetics departments in the Glasgow and Accra, Ghana, so that these training and clinical care initiatives can continue successfully after his retirement.
Kate Wensley
Kate is a Plastic Surgery Registrar who is based at the Royal Hospital for Children and Glasgow Royal Infirmary. She has travelled abroad to provide advanced plastics care as well as an ongoing training programme to local staff in Malawi, one of the world’s poorest countries.
This has restored care and function to patients and helped prevent ongoing morbidity and in some cases destitution from the inability to work.
Nursing and Midwifery
This award recognises nurse(s) who demonstrate the best qualities of patient care and the ethos of nursing.
Gold Winner – Renfrewshire Care Home Nursing Support Team
The Renfrewshire Care Home Nursing Support team (CHNST) is nominated for their approach to preventing unnecessary hospital admissions from care homes.
This is an innovative, nurse-led service which has empowered safe, effective care by providing a combination of reactive and proactive care, as well as advice. The service is run with a team of advanced nurse practitioners, a practice development nurse, care home liaison nurses and care home support nurses working in collaboration with care home staff to deliver person-centred care and staff development. It also promotes person-centred care planning which is evidence based.
This team provides service across all 23 older people care homes in Renfrewshire and two residential care homes in Inverclyde that borders Renfrewshire. In the year to 31 March 2023, they provided direct assessment to 772 care home residents resulting in 3048 consultations from which only 8% needed referral to acute services. Additionally, 68 training sessions have been provided ranging on a wide range of clinical topics.
Silver Winners
Ann Gray
Senior Charge Nurse Ann Gray works at Inverclyde Royal Hospital’s Emergency Department and has shown exemplary leadership skills, creating an inclusive, positive and compassionate environment for all staff and patients.
Ann’s calm and composed approach to patient safety and staff wellbeing is at the centre of everything she does, and she is described by colleagues as a “pillar of strength”. Her career spans across 30 years and her team look up to her.
Working in any Emergency Department is demanding with continued pressures and sustained activity. However, Ann manages to juggle resources with high expectations extremely well and regularly goes above and beyond the call of duty by coming in to help her team through challenging times.
Her positivity shines through and motivates those around her and allows her team to give the best possible care to patients.
Kirstie Law
Kirsty Law is an ENT emergency nurse practitioner at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital and has been recognised by colleagues for providing high-quality, patient-centred service.
Her role is to provide emergency care to patients with unscheduled ear, nose, and throat problems. As well as seeing primary care referrals and Emergency Department (ED) referrals she now also sees some patients straight from ED triage to decrease waiting times for these patients and help our busy ED.
She has established treat and discharge for many conditions which means that many patients no longer require inpatient admission. Last year, the treatment room saw 4500 patients for emergency care and diverted this workload away from our busy EDs.
As well as treating ENT emergency patients Kirstie has been integral in providing teaching and support to the junior doctors both informally on the ward in the treatment room and as formal induction teaching. She is consistently named in feedback as an individual who provides outstanding teaching and support.
Shona Scott
Shona, a Parkinson’s nurse specialist, has been working in Clyde Sector for more than 20 years, and in that time has developed nurse-led clinics, a nursing helpline for patients to contact between clinics as well as leading nurse education in Parkinson’s disease.
She was instrumental in developing the Movement Disorder Service in Clyde and has forged close supportive relationships with the patients she treats as well as supporting senior medics and acting as mentor to other nursing staff.
The service takes part in the national Parkinson’s audit every two years, which looks at patient experience in the service. Shona has been described by the patients she cares for as “always there if I need anything” and “always looking for the best treatment for me as an individual”.
Shona is due to retire this year, but while specialist nursing roles are more common now, staff in the service recognise Shona as “an early trailblazer 24 years ago” who has “a work ethic second to none” and an “immense” knowledge of Parkinson’s disease.
Volunteer
Recognising people who go the extra mile contributing tirelessly and providing outstanding help and support for the benefit of others.
Gold Winner – Hub Cafe Volunteers
Throughout NHSGGC, the value of safe, sociable, patient-focused spaces where people can meet, relax and spend quality time together, is huge, and the creation of such a space within a psychiatric hospital was of particular importance.
The Hub Café volunteer project at Gartnavel Royal Hospital was set up to establish such a space and, after the team was recruited, they have successfully delivered every aspect of the new café.
From Opening Hours to the range of activities on offer and from the menu to the way in which the Cafe is presented, the Team has worked hard to make the space the best it can be.
The volunteers perform a range of tasks from customer service to food hygiene and have embraced this new challenge with good humour and commitment. The fact that the drinks and snacks on offer are delicious is the icing on the cake!
Silver Winners
Marie Phillips
Marie Phillips is a rehabilitation support volunteer, who started supporting the Royal Alexandra Hospital during the Covid-19 pandemic.
She works with Allied Health Professionals in Orthopaedics to support and encourage patients with mobility and gentle recovery exercises.
Marie also spends time listening to patients and providing companionship to help lift their mood and has been described as an “incredible support at the RAH” who is popular with staff and patients.
In addition to this important role, Marie has also become a valued member of the RAH INSPIRE team.
Marie initially provided incredible support throughout the pandemic years as a key part of the RAH’s Volunteer Covid Response team, helping with the Give and Go service and in the hospital’s ICU Halo gardens.
Colleagues have described her as being “unfailingly generous”, with a natural ability to make patients feel at ease.
Claire Duffy
Claire Duffy is an Emergency Department Volunteer at the Queen Elizabeth University Hospital. The volunteer service had been set the objective to provide distraction and company to patients in the waiting rooms during winter of 2022. Initially a Volunteer Guide, Claire was asked to support the project.
In a short time, Claire had initiatives off the ground that supported patients and their families. These included distributing free newspapers, contacting newspaper distributers to source free crossword activities, and providing children with activities while they waited with parents.
Claire also noticed other areas where the volunteers could support. Before long, she was helping patients with phone access. Many would like to call home but weren’t sure how to work their mobile, access Wi-Fi, or have means to charge their phone. Claire supported by sourcing power banks and assisting where needed. She also sourced a bank of reading glasses for patients who had left theirs at home. All these small differences made a huge impact on people’s day. Patients were noticeably calmer once these changes were made.
