Introduction

Introductory message from Amanda

Welcome to the August Digital Report. This month the NHS Grampian Board met in Elgin and, as many of you will know, Dr Gray's celebrates it's 200th anniversary this year.

There is a strong legacy of care and innovation at Dr Gray's as well as across Moray and we look forward to supporting that as we move forward together into the future. We are also starting to examine at what a modern district hospital looks like and that'll help us in our planning for that future. It's an exciting time in Moray.

You'll see in this report that we are still doing work on the Sturrock Review, which focused on cultural issues at NHS Highland to identify how we can learn from the findings.

Since I've been in post, even when I was doing this on an interim basis, I've talked a lot about culture and how important it is to me individually but also to the System Leadership Team. There is a video below which captures a conversation between Caroline Hiscox and I that hopefully provides an interesting update on the progress that we are making with that.

In the next report we are going try something a little different by trying to capture on video how the System Leadership Team go about their business so you can actually see how we come to some of the decisions that we make.

As promised, this report also features an update on the development of the NHS Grampian Clinical Strategy. In the next few reports you will hear more about how you can get involved and influence that as well as why it really matters to all of us as health and social care staff.

The report also contains articles on some of the visits and work I've been doing over the last two months which I hope is of interest. Thank you once again for reading my report and feedback is always welcome.

Meet SLT Episode #4

Visit to Emergency Care Centre

It's important I get out and speak to staff to hear about the work they are doing, the challenges being faced, and what the System Leadership Team can do to offer further support.

Last month, the Chair and I visited the Emergency Care Centre at ARI. The day before I visited, there was a significant water leak in the Emergency Care Centre at ARI. Pictured are just a few of the staff that put well-rehearsed plans in place to get things working again so quickly.

Following the visit, Julie Wattie, Nurse Manager for Medicine 1, said: “It’s good to see the System Leadership Team taking positive action to increase their visibility like this. I’d encourage other areas to get in touch with them and arrange a visit – it makes a real difference and is a morale boost for staff. It’s also a great chance to talk about the work we are doing and highlight challenges that exist.”

Any of the System Leadership Team would be happy to come and visit your area so if that is something that would be useful please don’t hesitate to get in touch.

£1 million new CAMHS Facility Open For Business

I was delighted to be given a tour of our new CAMHS Centre of Excellence at the end of June.

Based at the former Links Unit at the City Hospital in Aberdeen, the facility has been given a £1million upgrade and brings together services under one roof.

Until the facility opened, City and Shire CAMHS staff, had been based across three sites and the number of patients they were able to see hampered by a lack of space.

The facility brings all of the service’s resources under one roof, with enough space to offer more than 850 hours of therapy each week.

It will also be closely linked with the Rowan Centre in Elgin which provides a similar service in Moray.

Dedicated areas have been set up to cater for young people of different ages up to the age of 18, with spaces for physio, a therapy kitchen and an intensive support facility.

I was pleased to meet some of our younger patients and their passion and enthusiasm for the new centre was clear for all to see. I’d also like to congratulate the project team for completing the significant overhaul of the old Links Unit in less than 12 months.