NHS Grampian would like to thank our fantastic Domestic and Support Services for their innovative work which will help visitors and staff finding it difficult to access sanitary products or experiencing period poverty. 

In April 2019 Scottish Government gave the instruction to increase access free sanitary products in all NHS Boards to include staff and visitors with the patient group already catered for. Unlike other Boards NHS Grampian has a large number of locations set over a vast geography, and this simple appearing task is in fact a huge one.  

NHS Grampian Domestic and Support Services set to work identifying all the toilets and worked with Procurement, Infection Control, Public Health and Sustainability colleagues to identify the suitable individually wrapped products and dispenser. Surprisingly there was not an off the self readily available option for either.  

The onset of the pandemic halted work, and in 2021 amongst the operational commitments of enhanced cleaning a small team worked with a UK based SaniStation to co-design a bespoke gender-neutral and IPC compliant sanitary dispenser which will be installed in over 1,000 toilets across NHS Grampian.

Head of Domestic and Support Services, Gillian Poskitt commented; ‘’All the designs the team could find were highly gendered for use in female toilets, but our team really wanted a gender neutral design which would appropriate to use in all our toilets, to ensure we are not creating period inequality for any of our staff or visitors.

We have already installed gender neutral sanitary dispensers in just under 200 toilets, and with approx. 900 more on the way, we hope to make a difference to anyone unable to buy sanitary products for any reason. It is hope the sustainable product discussions will restart once we’ve got all our locations have dispensers installed.’’

We would like to give special thanks to ‘Pauline Matthews, Donna Duncan and Cherrie Young’ for all their hard work, a great example of a small team making a big difference.

For any feedback or questions please email: gram.domestic@nhs.scot, or speak to the Assistant Domestic Services Manager for your area (team organisational chart found here on our intranet page)

 

Published: 08/08/2023 16:16