Chair Update
Dear Members, Colleagues & Patients
Another winter, another crisis affecting the NHS. The panic around Group A strep, increases in other respiratory illnesses, delays in A&E and workforce strikes impacts us all in primary care.
The Fed have been working alongside the local ICB team, RFL and CLCH to address the surge the whole system is experiencing from the increase in patients presenting with concerns about Group A strep infection and Scarlet Fever. I am pleased to say we have been able to agree a model of care to support the system that will be provide additional face-2-face appointments for these children. Further details on the pathway and how patients can access the service will be publicised soon.
The Federation team has been busy managing the Extended Access sub-contracts for some of our PCNs as well as providing the separate ‘bridging service’ to provide appointments at weekends and bank holidays (not covered by the EA DES). It is a challenge to get all the sessions staffed but our team is working hard behind the scenes to get this done.
Looking back over the last year we have seen a lot of changes at the Federation including my chairmanship, forging stronger links with Barnet Training Hub and working evermore closely with PCNs, the local ICB team and LMC on the GP Cabinet.
I’d like to thank all the staff within the Federation, our member practices and PCNs along with my cabinet colleagues for all you have done over the past year to ensure that our patients in the borough receive the best possible primary care in very challenging circumstances.
All of us in our practices have been working extra hard to cope with the current situation but I hope you can, at least, get some time to rest and recharge over the holiday period with family and friends.
Happy New Year to you all from Barnet GP Federation.
Dr Ahmer Farooqi
Headlines
Christmas Services – Thank You!
A big thank you to everyone involved for all their efforts in making the four-day Christmas period go smoothly. The team worked very hard making sure all the preparations were in place, and those who worked over these four days ensured a smooth service delivery.
Polio Vaccination Clinics
In the lead up to Christmas, the Federation supported PCNs 5 and 6 with the enablement of a Polio Vaccination catch up service. Following the discovery of active Polio in London water, this dedicated clinic allowed patients wishing to have the vaccination the opportunity to do so.
SMI Checks
The Federation is pleased to be able to continue to support practices with the SMI health checks. We will shortly be working with commissioners to look at opportunities to gather more data to further enhance the quality of the service.
Anticoagulation
An update on whether there will be a service extension, or a re-procurement is expected soon. In the meantime, the service continues to operate well with an effective mix of clinical pharmacists providing good quality service delivery.
BFG Recruiting for BFG Extended Access (EA) service
BFGs will be onboarding new sessional GPs into the EA service. If you would like to find out more about the onboarding process as well as sessions and how to book them or would like to join the Federation, please email: barnet.federation@nhs.net
Date for your diary – Pan Barnet Event
Wednesday 11th January 2023 at 13.00 – Update from the Adult Assessment Unit (AAU)
Click here to join the meeting
For further practice support, training information and research updates please see below
Support For Our Practices
Welcome to our vacancy board – Do you have a vacancy or looking for a role in Barnet?
Advertising job opportunities via the Federation website!
Practices and professionals seeking job opportunities in Barnet can advertise through our website on our Pan Barnet Noticeboard: https://barnetfederatedgps.org.uk/pan-barnet-recruitment/
Paediatric Assessment Hub
The Federation has been working with commissioners and practices to provide dedicated face-to-face appointment slots that will improve paediatric capacity for Barnet. Patients can be booked in directly from NHS 111 and Barnet A&E, to help ease some of their system pressures.
The service will be available for patients from birth to 17 years of age who are registered with a Barnet practice. Sessions can be any time between 9am – 8pm, dependent on what support practices can give. The sessions will be hosed on Federation EMIS ensuring centralised management and governance arrangements.
In-hours Practice Support
Additional sessions throughout December are now in high demand. The Federation will do our best to support this, subject to available workforce. While sessions will continue to be filled on a first come first served basis, we will make every effort to balance the workforce across practices.
Salaried GP
Ongoing recruitment for Salaried GPs to work primarily in EAS and other Federation services. If you are interested and would like to be considered, please refer to the attached Job Description for more details, or email: barnet.federation@nhs.net.
Extended Access (EA) Service
The new Extended Access service has continued into November and continues to work well.
GP appointments will continue to be telephone or video consultations in the first instance, and the patient will be booked for a face-to-face appointment if needed.
Over the last couple of weeks, we have been asked for reminders on the opening hours and appointment release times for the service. Please see a summary below:
Patients can still access the service by calling NHS 111 or the Federation call centre number, 020 3948 6809. These appointments have been commissioned separately and are not part of the PCN EA service.
Hubs are open as follows:
Weekdays 6:30pm to 9:00pm
Saturday 9:00am – 5:00pm
Sunday 8:00am – 8:00pm
Weekday appointments are same day bookable and released in two phases at 10:00am and 3:00pm.
Saturday appointments are released in two phases, on Monday at 8:00am and Wednesday at 8:00am.
If you have any questions or queries, please contact our services team on: barnetfederatedgps.services@nhs.net
Training Information and Opportunities
For all Barnet Training Hub events and training opportunities, please visit: https://www.barnetcepn.org.uk/
Greetings – Barnet Training Hub
Season’s greetings to everyone from the Barnet Training Hub. It has been another year of amazing work, trying our best to deliver education and support to primary care, despite all the challenges we have faced over the last 12 months. With lots of work going on behind the scenes, we have managed to bring our activity more closely aligned to that of the Federation and other services within the borough. Over the next year, we hope to deliver more services that can support general practice.
Our team has been awarded for educational activity supporting “Whzan” in care homes, and practices across the borough. In addition, clinicians in the team have gone onto take up bigger and better roles using the experience they have gained from working with us! We really hope to have more face to face education opportunities in 2023, as well as to offer more roles for clinicians of all backgrounds who are keen to explore educational and management roles.
We know just how difficult workloads are at this moment in time, so well-being and looking after each other has become so much more important.
Stay safe and enjoy the holidays!
With best wishes from the team at the Barnet Training Hub
Digital Care Homes Coordinator
The post holder will review remote monitoring data (vital signs and National Early Warning Scores 2 (NEWS2)) for care home residents, with the aim of facilitating timely identification and access to appropriate clinical input for deteriorating patients. Working as part of a Multi-Disciplinary Team (MDT) they will also contribute to the creation of personalised care plans using individual patient data obtained via remote monitoring.
For further details or to apply please click on the link: https://beta.jobs.nhs.uk/candidate/jobadvert/U0003-22-7699
Closing date 13th Jan 2023
Xytal New to Partnership Programme – January Date
The Xytal New to Partnership Programme has been designed for clinicians who are new to partnership or seek to perform at their best in this new role as you may already be aware. Shehla Paul-Patel (Sales Manager at Xytal) is happy to answer any further questions you may have.
There is one upcoming New to Partnership Programme; 19th January 2023. Please click here for further information.
Also here is a link regarding the training fund available New to Partnership funding
For further information, please contact Shehla on: 07729 039548 or Central Office: 0113 834 5015. Alternatively, if you are ready, you can email N2P@xytal.com to start the booking process.
Frailty journey – early recognition to end of life lecture day
A lecture series with panel discussion aimed at primary and secondary care practitioners. Topics will include recognising frailty, managing complex comorbidity in the elderly, advance care planning, rationalising medications and the approach to polypharmacy, recognising dying in advanced frailty and end of life care. Please click here for more information.
Wednesday 1st February 0900-1700
Barnet Hospital – Post Graduate Education Centre – EN5 3DJ
Book to reserve your place – The Frailty Journey – From Early Recognition to End of Life Tickets, Wed 1 Feb 2023 at 08:30 | Eventbrite
Dr Shama Mani MB ChB FRCP(UK) (Geriatric Medicine) – smani@nhs.net
Barnet Pan Barnet Event: AAU update with Dr Sarah Fowler plus updates from Local Services
Following on from the update in May 2022 we are pleased to have back to the Barnet Pan Barnet event Dr Sarah Fowler and Dr Lauren Farber. We will also have our regular updates from Barnet GP Fed and other local services.
BTH Presents: Surviving or Thriving – Let’s talk about Burnout, Resilience and Flourishing at work
Facilitated interactive workshop for Nurses and Pharmacists, hosted by Dr Rakhee Shah, Nurse Tanya Brazza and Pharmacist Evonne French.
Join us for this interactive session in which we will look at the below:-
- Recognise factors that lead to burnout and resilience
- Assess and discuss personal risk of burnout and picking it up in others
- Exercises to boost your own resilience
- Share resources and ideas to boost your resilience
Once we receive your registration we shall send you the link and resources to join with. See you on the 17th January at 1300-1400! Please do share with your Barnet Nurses and Pharmacists Colleagues!
For more information please email: Barnet.cepnadmin@nhs.net
Research
Research Studies for Barnet GP Practices
Many thanks for the huge support from Barnet practices this year – we know how busy practices are, and are looking to see how we can better support you with research in 2023. We will be in touch early in the new year with some ideas to help you.
Studies coming in Jan 2023 include:
- HPValidate (a follow-up to the YouScreen – cervical smear self-test – study), with support for practices from Noclor
- Online support programme for bipolar patients who are parents
- A study to get clinician views on Perinatal anxiety
We will give more details in the New Year – we will also be contacting practices about some on-going “search & send” studies, in particular HARMONIE (the RSV vaccine trial) and VAPELINE (smoking cessation)
For more information, please feel free to contact:
Dr Jo Yong – barccg.barnetresearchnetwork@nhs.net
David Jones at Noclor – davidjones@nhs.net