Grant Taylor, Site Manager and Director of Nursing for Broadmeadows Hospital and Craigieburn Centre, always starts his working day with a coffee, which he prepares at the office.

“Then I wander to the wards, ask staff how the previous shift has been and meet with the coordinators. I conduct a lot of meetings, take some time to meet patients and it’s all about keeping Broadmeadows Hospital and Craigieburn Centre operational and ensuring we are meeting the demands,” he said.

Prior to coming to Northern Health this winter, Grant was at Melbourne Health for five and a half years as a Nurse Unit Manager and After Hours Manager.

“Northern Health was the right opportunity at the right time. I was looking to get into a more senior role for a long time, and I heard a lot about Northern Health and how it progressed a lot. I saw it as a professional challenge and something that would get me out of my comfort zone,” he said.

Grant lived in Sydney almost all of his life, with two and a half years of living in London and working in emergency nursing. He came to Victoria in 2014, looking for a change of pace and surroundings. He is now enjoying his role and is ready to face any challenges.

“I enjoy leading the team. There is a lot of opportunity here and such a broad mix of services – surgery, subacute, acute, and always something going on here. What I love most is how friendly the team are and how ready they are for change,” he said.

“The challenge is keeping up on where the organisation is going, but that is becoming easier now with all the communication that has been implemented. Access and the demand for services, and balancing with patient expectations is our biggest challenge, as an organisation,” he added.

When he is not busy at work looking after Broadmeadows Hospital or Craigieburn Centre, he usually travels or is planning at least a road trip to a nearby town.

“I have been traveling a lot and I’ve developed a blog too. Every second year I do a big trip of four or six weeks and if I am not planning an overseas trip, I am looking into towns I could visit and drives I can do,” he added.

His interests also include movies, eating out and something not many people know about him.

“I have a quirky sense of humor which only some of my colleagues see now. Also, I used to be a competitive dressage rider – I used to show horses in show jumping, cross country and competitive dressage – haven’t done that in a long time,” he said.

In the future, Grant sees Broadmeadows Hospital as a high functioning acute and subacute service, a place that patients want to come to that not only meets the community expectations, but surpasses them.

“We have a new leadership team coming in the Nurse Unit Manager space and that will help drive Broadmeadows Hospital forward,” he said.

When it comes to Craigieburn Centre, he said it is a fantastic service delivering timely access to health care for a diverse population group.

“There have been some amazing developments in the past 18 months including the introduction of the Rapid Access Iron Infusion Clinic. In the future, I would foresee increased continued growth in the Day Procedure department as well as the addition of new and exciting services,” he added.

During the previous month, we have been seeing news about cyber-attacks on hospitals, especially a significant attack which affected hospitals in the Gippsland and South West regions of Victoria. The attack led to some of the hospitals, including Barwon Health to cancel some elective surgery and appointments. We monitor these events closely and take them very seriously.

A couple of days ago, we have received important information from DHHS via the Victorian Government Cyber Incident Response Service (CIRS) that Victorian Government organisations are being targeted in phishing campaigns attempting to deploy malware known as Emotet.

The organisations impacted reported receiving phishing emails containing malicious Microsoft Word documents. The Microsoft Word documents contain a macro which, when enabled, downloads Emotet malware to the user’s device. If you see a suspicious document, please let us know.

We have also been alerted by the Australian Cyber Security Centre on Scam Text messages on phones targeting Australia Post Customers. The widespread scam text messages are telling customers there are problems delivering a package, or that a parcel won’t be delivered “due to unverified shipping address.” Please make sure you never click on links which ask for your personal information.

At Northern Health, we have a number of systems in place to protect ourselves from potential cyber security attacks, but we also need you to be vigilant! Your email is the most likely entrance for such attacks.

I would like to personally assure everyone that we are taking all precautions to prevent malware entering into the Northern Health network and are monitoring for any malicious traffic.

Should you identify any suspicious links, emails or documents, please contact the ICT team at ServiceHUB@nh.org.au or ext 52222.

David Ryan

Chief Information Officer

 

Northern Health recently celebrated the graduating class of 2019 Business Administration and Community Services students at Northern Hospital Epping.

Of the graduating Certificate II students, Northern Health is offering placements to four students to complete their Certificate III in 2020.

Northern Health has a partnership with AGA Apprenticeships Plus to provide eligible students with the opportunity to complete a Certificate II in Business Administration or Certificate II in Community Services whilst completing Year 11 or 12.

Students attend placement one day per week across a number of departments including People & Culture, Women’s & Children’s Services and Ambulatory Care at Northern Hospital Epping, Broadmeadows Hospital and Bundoora Centre.

Penelope Grellet, Director of Organisational Capability, said, “At Northern Health, we are proud of our partnership with AGA, which enables local students access to work placements combined with the ability to complete a formal qualification.”

“The students bring passion and energy, and contribute to teams right across the organisation. This ongoing partnership is part of our commitment to the northern community as the largest employer in the region,” she added.

“I was really excited to learn new things about the hospital and I have learnt so much!” said Amanda Samuela, Cert II in Community Services Graduate.

The first School Based Traineeship Program (SBAT) commenced in 2017 with eight students. Since then, the program has grown to include the Certificate III in Business Administration qualification whereby students work full time at Northern Health for a period of 12 months.

In the lead up to this year’s 80’s themed Northern Health Foundation Dinner, we sat down with Divisional Director of Surgery, Wanda Stelmach, to find out what she was doing in the 80’s! Read her story below. To purchase your tickets to the Dinner, please click here.

1980’s was a decade of firsts for me!

I went from being a medical student in a short coat to junior doctor in a long coat!

I went from paying Uni fees of around $300 to being paid an income! However, the hours facing residents in the 80’s were horrible with 36 hour (overnight and the following day), 60 hour (two overnights and the following day) and the ‘best’ shift started on Saturday morning and continued through Sunday, Monday to Tuesday 5 pm – 84 hours on-site – that’s why we had Resident’s Quarters.

And then you came back on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday and continued your 12 hour shifts. A fortnight of 180 hours that was legally rostered and by the 1980’s, paid for! In the previous decades, rosters did not recognise on-going shifts through the night and you only got paid for 8 hour days although you worked the hours above!

Residents were a tight bunch in those days because we lived in the hospital so much of our time. The nurses (mainly young and female) lived in the nurses home which was strictly off-limits to the young and predominantly male doctors…but that didn’t stop the shenanigans, even though Matron patrolled the premises. Parties were wild especially around the pool in summer on Friday nights.

I fully paid for my first overseas holiday – Thailand! I fell in love with a country that was so exotic by Australian standards and represented so much freedom to a Polish girl whose parents still exercised control over their children! My love of Thailand led me to adopt my son and daughter in later years.

I bought and paid for my first car burgundy Holden Gemini 5 speed with manual choke. May need to explain that to the young ones!

I fell in love, got engaged and got married that decade. Our friends from around the world sent us their best wishes by telegrams – before emails, SMS and other platforms.

The bride and bridesmaids wore puffy sleeves to the wedding as one did. Thank goodness we didn’t go with the puffy hair! But it was all there in best 1980’s style at my 10 year school reunion – oversize jackets, oversize shoulder pads and oversize hair! Effie/Mary Coustas from Acropolis Now reigned!

Going from zero dollars to big bucks, I bought my first house with a startling mortgage interest rate of 17.5%.

Even though I was the breadwinner and my husband the law student, I had to bring him along to the bank interview, as the bank manager did not believe that a woman should be given a loan without male support…Don’t get me started!

My first country rotation was internship in surgery in Wangaratta– I fell in love with surgery and never gave medicine a chance. I also developed an appreciation of wineries and good wines which I could now afford.

I sat my entry exams in surgery toward the end of that decade and my surgical career was set when I passed the exams. Haven’t looked back, but did have to deal with surgeons, hospital staff and patients who believed that a female surgeon is an anachronism and a woman would never be as good as a man! Today’s world still has some of these perceptions but with #LookLikeASurgeon, attitudes are changing!

And all this was to the music of Eye of the Tiger, Like a Virgin, Another One Bites the Dust, Wake Me up Before you Go-Go, Flashdance, Papa Don’t Preach, Bette Davis Eyes, Karma Chameleon and Cyndi Lauper’s Girls just want to have fun! And I did!

At the International Forum on Quality & Safety in Healthcare in Taiwan, Clare McCarthy, Project Manager PMO/HRO Transformation Unit, presented a poster on our Comprehensive Unit-based Safety Programs (CUSP).

Clare attended the ‘Transforming Quality for Tomorrow’ Conference, to present an ePoster ‘The CUSP of High Reliability – Implementing Comprehensive Unit-based Safety Programs at Northern Health’.

“I presented to an international audience of clinicians, academics and health administrators on how Northern Health is the first health service in Australia to embark on establishing itself as a High Reliability Organisation (HRO). The Comprehensive Unit-based Safety Program (CUSP) is a key component of our HRO endeavour, providing a clinical method for improving patient safety through improved teamwork, communication and fostering clinical awareness and best practice. Put together with Dr Katharine See and Dr Bill Shearer, the poster tells the story of CUSPs thus far,” she said.

CUSPs empower staff by breaking down old hierarchies of decision making. It’s egalitarian — all experience and perspectives are heard, and the CUSP begins to identify system defects and how these might be fixed.

“Clinical leaders get to see unit-based activity for themselves — they listen to local points of view and tend to apply their observations,” Clare said.

Clare explained how the CUSP framework is being embedded at Northern Health through ‘CUSP 101’ — an evolving program of multidisciplinary CUSPs, building networks of clinical using ‘science of safety’ to understand and prevent adverse events, establishing teamwork and collaboration across clinical specialties and expanding to embrace issues of safety and culture that affect the whole organisation.

“To date, eight clinical CUSPs have been established to meet the challenge of Northern Health’s HRO commitment, including Respiratory, General Medicine (at two campuses), Neurology, Respiratory Outpatients, Palliative Care, Intensive Care Unit and Medical Oncology,” Clare explained.

The Respiratory CUSP was the first to be established and is the most mature at Northern Health. It has 30 members, both clinical and non-clinical and meets monthly.

“We were the first,” said Dr Katharine See, Head of Respiratory Medicine.

“The Respiratory and now the Respiratory Outpatient CUSPs are proving invaluable. The CUSP model has helped us address more than 40 safety issues since we started. And, it’s my favourite meeting of the month,” Katharine said.

“We’re moving towards a system based on learning,” said Dr Bill Shearer, Executive Director Quality, Safety and Transformation.

“This approach is now creating the momentum we need for transformational change.”

While in Taipei, Clare also attended the ‘Lessons from Aviation Safety and High-Speed Rail’ – one of the ‘experience days’ available to attendees. The day included a visit to the newly inaugurated Taiwan Transportation Safety Board (TTSB) — which investigates Taiwan’s aviation, shipping railway and highway incidents — and the Taiwan High Speed Rail (THSR). Both organisations are modelled on HRO principles of efficiency and safety with obvious implications for health services.

Clare and Katharine will present on developments in CUSP at the International Forum on Quality & Safety in Healthcare in Copenhagen in April 2020.

Each year, Northern Health graduate nurses and midwives are required to complete a project aimed at improving the quality and safety of the patients they provide care for.

This year, there were 66 posters presented by graduates representing the quality activity they undertook. Posters were judged based on innovation, improving patient experience and addition to nursing knowledge.

Displayed simultaneously with Research Week, the posters created significant interest and demonstrated the skill of these emerging nurse/midwifery leaders who are clearly focused on improving the patient journey.

And the winner is…

Stefanie Shears for her project: Pre-operative fasting time affecting dietary nutritional intake

Stefanie has been awarded attendance to the Safer Care Victoria Giant Steps Conference in Melbourne later this year.

“It was an honour to work alongside some really amazing people and it was great that I was able to find out a lot about nutrition in terms of postoperative patients. I think the research I’ve done can further help patients and their care,” Stefanie said.

Three nurses and midwives also received highly commended awards for their quality projects below.

Saskia Tykocinski: Languages spoken and newborn feeding outcomes

Erica Spessot: Understanding the commonalities between neonates readmitted for jaundice management

Elsan Paul: Vascular assessment tool in dialysis

Debra Bourne, Chief Nursing and Midwifery Officer, said, “I had the opportunity to speak to these graduate nurses and midwives when they presented their posters – I was overwhelmed and impressed by their enthusiasm and commitment to not only their role as nurses and midwives at Northern Health, but also to the value that nursing and midwifery has in improving patient outcomes.”

Featured Image (left to right): Saskia, Erica, Elsan and Stefanie

Mother of two, Katrina Pirpinias, is one of many breast cancer survivors who is using the month of October to reflect on her experiences as part of Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

Katrina was diagnosed in 2013 after noticing a lump in one of her breasts and biopsy results confirmed she had three cancerous lumps.

“I must have had a blank look of my face. I was quiet and calm for about 40 seconds and then panic set in and I said, what are my kids going to do? My initial sadness was for my kids,” Katrina tell us.

“After that I went straight off to Cheryl, the Northern Health Breast Care Nurse, and started my ‘journey’. That morning was spent discussing all the ways we could go with surgery and treatments,” she said.

Katrina encourages women who have recently been diagnosed with breast cancer to just take a moment.

“Don’t think of the worst case scenario straight away, just give yourself time to let it all sink in. Then listen to the advice and take it on board clearly and calmly,” she said.

“Take a breath and slow down. Remember that everyone’s journey is different – someone else’s story is different to your story.”

Breast Care Nurse, Cheryl Murray, said, “What you don’t usually hear are all the good stories – and the majority are the good stories. 91 per cent of women will survive breast cancer after five years.”

“The moment you get diagnosed with cancer, you start to decondition but it’s important to keep routine – go to work if you are able, keep routine for the kids as that’s really important for them, keep busy and exercise,” Cheryl added.

“I felt ordinary, but I still did normal things, I still went camping, still took the kids to school every day,” Katrina said.

After losing her hair from chemotherapy treatment, Katrina said, “I was lucky because it was in winter so it didn’t really stand out but I didn’t like not having eyebrows or eyelashes – that made me look unwell.”

“I remember my girlfriend cut my hair when the first clump came out and I wasn’t quite ready to let go of my hair,” she added.

Six years later, following chemotherapy and a double mastectomy, Katrina has a new bill of health.

Katrina’s story is one of many, as breast cancer remains the most common cancer among Australian women.

The month of October is dedicated to focusing on the impact of those affected by breast cancer in our community, and raising awareness of early detection.

“Breast cancer awareness is all about getting to know your breasts and what they feel like, and if there’s any changes, see your GP. While screening mammograms are primarily recommended for women aged 50-74, women aged 40-49 are welcome to have a free breast screening mammogram with BreastScreen Victoria every two years,” Cheryl said.

“Early detection is such a massive factor for survival and Australia has one of the highest survival rates in the world, so we’re doing something right.”

This Friday, in honour of Breast Cancer Awareness Month, we are holding a ‘Think Pink’ competition encouraging staff to wear pink in support. To enter, please take a photo of yourself in pink and email it to Northern Health Foundation for your chance to win a Hoyts gift card. The winner will be judged based on creativity, attention to detail and pink-ness!

Northern Health Foundation are also currently fundraising for a new scalp cooling machine for our Craigieburn Oncology Unit. Scalp cooling machines help to preserve hair by cooling hair follicles so they are not as affected by chemotherapy, helping to retain hair and improve self esteem. Click here to donate today!

For more information on breast health and awareness, click here.

Featured Image (left to right): Katrina Pirpinias with Cheryl Murray 

The fourth and final ceremony for 2019 of our Staff Recognition Awards was held today, to formally recognise outstanding contributions by our employees and celebrate staff excellence.

Siva Sivarajah, Northern Health Chief Executive, said we have over 5,000 staff who work across a wide range of areas and who are committed to providing great care.

“We would like to recognise them for their hard work and dedication to our patients, staff and community. These are staff who exemplify a strong and positive workplace culture and commitment to our patients,” he said.

The six categories and the winners are:

Clinical Excellence: A clinician or clinical team generous with knowledge, who instils confidence in patients and colleagues, and achieves the best patient experience outcomes; And the winner is…Fiona Moate, Senior Clinician, Hand Therapy

Patient Experience: An individual or team who has made a significant achievement in improving the care experience, including showing kindness and compassion towards a patient or their family; And the winner is…Lina Gencarelli, Specialist Clinics, Reception

Excellence in Safety: An individual or team who has assisted in making Northern Health safer for patients, visitors or staff; And the winner is…Michelle Morrow, Nurse Unit Manager, Maternity

Innovation: A team or individual who implemented a better way to deliver care or service through a new idea or initiative; And the winner is…Monica Dowling, ICU Liaison Nurse

Above and Beyond: An individual who has gone above and beyond in providing care or support to a patient, family or work colleague; And the winner is… Kathryn Rough, Library Manager

Rising Star: A staff member recognised as having great potential to grow and develop in their career at Northern Health; And the winner is… Toni Gabelish, Aboriginal Liaison Officer

“Congratulations to all of our winners and thank you to our award sponsors – Maxxia and BankVic for your continued support,” Siva said.

Sponsored by Maxxia and BankVic, our Quarterly Staff Recognition Awards have been designed to formally recognise outstanding contributions by our employees and celebrate staff excellence. To nominate a staff member, click here.

Featured Image (left to right): Toni Gabelish; Lina Gencarelli; Michelle Morrow; Laurelle Bland (accepting the award on behalf of Fiona Moate); Tim Bond from Maxxia; Kathryn Rough; Bridget Walters (accepting the award on behalf of Monica Dowling).