Laurelle Bland, Occupational Therapist – Hand Therapy Service, has been using Telehealth (video calls) in the treatment of hand therapy trauma for several weeks now.

She says, “Telehealth has enabled me to effectively treat patients who are unable to attend due to COVID-19. It is also very cost and time effective for our rural patients, who can now receive treatment online rather than having to drive to Melbourne.”

Laurelle says she has found video calls allow her to visually assess the patient rather than relying on subjective reporting over the phone, which then better guides her treatment.

“I have even been able to measure range of motion on the screen using a goniometer,” says Laurelle.

Says Laurelle, “Telehealth has changed our hand therapy treatment for the better and I am excited by the opportunity it provides in making our service more accessible, time efficient and cost effective.”

Allied Health is working on expanding our Telehealth service across other outpatient clinics and community therapy services.

Tracey Webster, Telehealth Project Officer, is pleased to see the Hand Therapy Clinic use Telehealth – for a couple of reasons.

“My daughter has been a patient twice as a child/teenager at the Hand Therapy Clinic. She is now 23 and a land surveyor and has no problems with her hands and is grateful for the care she received. For me, being able to assist the Hand Therapy Clinic team in being able to provide their patients with access to video calls was a privilege,” she says.

Briana Baass, Chief Allied Health Officer and Partnerships, sees digitally enabled models of care helping Northern Health achieve its strategic plan and be more equipped to meet the future demand and needs of our community.

“Ultimately, these initiatives leverage the benefits of technology to improve service access, efficiency and responsiveness in order to work towards delivering ‘anytime, anywhere care’,” says Briana.

Bec Gilbert, Manager Organisational Capability at Northern Health, today confirmed that the Telehealth Hub has gone live in the myLearning LMS.

It will provide staff across the organisation access to relevant training and education, receive up-to-date information, facilitate ongoing dialogue across all sites and a platform to share information, issues, and solutions regarding Telehealth.

Early evaluation and patient feedback from the Allied Health pilot clinics indicate that patients felt the video Telehealth consultation addressed their health care needs, and all patients surveyed indicated they would prefer to use Telehealth for their next appointment rather than attend in person.

Here’s what a couple of patients had to say:

“I don’t think it could be improved. It was an excellent consultation.”

“Keep offering it please!”

Featured image shows Laurelle Bland,  Occupational Therapist in consultation with a patient on Telehealth.

Our new Northern Health Strategic Plan 2020-24 has five priorities and one of them has a strong focus on our staff – enabling and empowering them to focus on safety and professional development.

Working towards this goal means that our staff will have the skills, knowledge, motivation and opportunity to make a difference for our patients and each other. By providing education and development opportunities, staff will be empowered to improve the safety of the health service.

“Education is not the only road to empowering our teams,” said Dr Megan Robb, Director of Emergency.

“When we think about teamwork, our goal is to have teams where multidisciplinary communication, problem solving and innovation is encouraged,” she explained.

Teamwork is important at Northern Health and by developing these structured and functional teams, our staff will be able to achieve more and go further.

“To acknowledge and celebrate our success, Northern Health will enhance staff recognition programs and performance systems,” said Michelle Fenwick, Executive Director, People and Culture.

“We are working towards becoming an employer of choice,” Michelle added.

Julie Mason, Patient Services Assistant, explained how we support staff in their work.

“At Northern Health, staff are engaged and empowered to use all their skills and knowledge. We are a team and it’s a great place to work!” she said.

Please see the video below to hear more on what ‘enabled staff, empowered teams’ means to some of our staff:

Northern Health has over 300 dedicated volunteers, who work across our site to help us provide support and care to our patients. Unfortunately, during the current pandemic, our volunteers cannot be onsite. Although we miss them terribly, we are looking at innovative ways to keep in touch, and for them to know that all our staff and volunteers are in this together.

One of these is a daily newsletter. Last week the Volunteer Services Team, sent out their 100^th newsletter, that provides information, humour, (called ‘Vollie Jollies’) and inspiration that keeps the volunteers connected with each other.

Henni Wade, Manager of Volunteer Services says “Although our volunteers are currently unable to attend their roles due to COVID-19, the Volunteer Services Team has been working hard on helping our volunteers stay well at home.”

“Our newsletters provide a platform to share what the volunteers have been doing from the safety of their homes, “she adds.

“The volunteers have told us that the daily newsletter is something they look forward to and as the ‘unknown’ increases their anxiety, having daily communication helps to relieve this anxiety.  They also enjoy hearing and seeing photos of what other volunteers are doing,” says Henni.

The daily newsletter also includes wellbeing tips to help volunteers keep their minds and bodies healthy and cooking and craft ideas.

“We encourage the volunteers to be guest editors and to send through content for the newsletters. We also provide suggestions for encouraging volunteers to monitor their own health and suggested resources for them to seek further help if they are feeling isolated and depressed,” she says.

Henni points out, “The team is aware that not everyone has a computer or smart-phone to stay in touch so have been making targeted calls to those volunteers whom we identify as being socially isolated.  We have definitely felt that some of those calls have been a life-line for a few of the volunteers.”

Mandy Davis one of our long standing volunteers at Northern Hospital, says she is bored but doing the right thing and staying mostly at home except to go out once every two weeks to do her shopping. She says she is thrilled to get the newsletter. “ I felt I’m still part of the volunteers and it has been so good to be kept up to date on everything that has been happening and how hard every one is working there. I’m so proud of everyone and just to know how everyone is doing, has been really good.”

As Henni says. “We are definitely in this together!”

Featured picture shows our volunteers in pre-COVID times.

Our Residential In-Reach program provides specialist medical and nursing support to nursing homes seven days a week. With COVID-19, due to multiple outbreaks in our catchment, the team have substantially increased both medical and nursing staffing to meet the demand. With the recent outbreaks in St Basil’s and Heritage Epping Gardens, Dr Sandra Brown and her team were the first to arrive.

Dr Brown, Residential In-Reach Program Lead, explained the team now have three doctors and three nurses available to go out into nursing homes seven days a week.

“In these facilities, our team is usually the first on the ground, when we are notified of an outbreak. We go in and advise on processes on how to reduce the risk of infection. While the staff in nursing homes have plans for these situations, they might lack practical experience in managing a pandemic outbreak. That is when our team gives practical advice on stopping the spread and necessary immediate measures,” she explained.

The response team, usually a doctor and a nurse, will provide basic infection control advice and check on COVID-19 positive residents to determine if they are stable enough to stay in the facility. The team also provides information to families, notifies them of the resident’s condition and tries to understand what their wishes are.

Dr Brown explains that, from her experience, COVID-19 patients are often stable in the first week, and then they can rapidly get very sick.

“We monitor them over that week period to ensure they remain stable. Most of our work is checking that everyone is stable. We offer residents oxygen and fluids in the facility if they do not wish for hospital care. If someone is dying, we ensure they are comfortable and have the right medication for end of life symptoms,” she explained.

While providing care to the stable patients, the team also monitors the patients that have deteriorated and arranges transfer to hospital if required.

Although COVID-19 is currently the main focus for the team, they still provide care to residents who might have other health issues, like falls and low blood sugar levels.

“The families are grateful to hear on how their relative is going, and the aged care staff in those facilities really appreciate that we are there, as it does show them help is available,” she said.

Program team members are very committed, and a number of senior medical staff have volunteered to do extra shifts. That has enabled the program to now have senior geriatricians available on the weekends too, which previously wasn’t the case. A number of senior nurses with aged care experience have agreed to be redeployed to the team, and the Hospital in the Home team have also been supporting.

“I am really proud how doctors and nurses across Northern Health have supported this service and enabled us to do our job of providing care in nursing homes, whilst avoiding people coming to hospital who aren’t going to benefit from hospital care,” Dr Brown said.

Dr Paul Viray is one of the team members – he is a registrar and geriatric medicine advanced trainee.

“It’s been hectic in the last couple of weeks. The team has been working extended hours to help improve the quality of life for the nursing home residents. It has been an absolute honour to work with the whole team. We will keep going – this is what we do and we’ll do whatever it takes to keep residents well and protect their quality of life,” he said.

“We are in this together”… This has been one of the most commonly used phrases during the COVID-19 pandemic that people from all over the world have been using in solidarity.

Together makes up one of our news values here at Northern Health, along with Safe and Kind – the three of which will help us to achieve our vision of a healthier community, making a difference for every person, every day, as outlined in our Northern Health Strategic Plan 2020-24.

The current pandemic has shown just how critical it is to work together across our entire health service – and support and encourage one another while doing so.

Briana Baass, Chief Allied Health Officer and Partnerships, explained what the value together means to her.

“All of us working as one team to look after our patients together – from medical, nursing and allied health to non-clinical staff – we all enable this to happen,” she said.

For the wider community, Together applies to health networks and community organisations across our catchment area working collaboratively to help people in the community have access to the best possible care.

“From a partnership perspective, it’s about how we come together across the whole northern system to create an integrated care system for our community, while we work together with our consumers,” Briana added.

Together is especially relevant in the concept of ‘Staying Well’ where we work to address the needs of patients with complex conditions both in hospital-based and community care.

Briana used the example of the project, ‘Staying Well with diabetes in the north’ – a partnership between Northern Health, Eastern Melbourne Primary Health Network and DPV Health which aims for an integrated, multidisciplinary wrap around service model for community members living with diabetes.

“An important aspect of this is is the way we use patient-reported outcome measures to help shared decision-making, so we are working together to design their own treatment plan,” Briana said.

During COVID-19, working with our community partners has become especially important.

Together with Max Lee, the CEO of Hume Whittlesea Primary Care Partnership, Briana said they realised there would be a lot of people who will be isolated in the community – “This isn’t necessarily Northern Health’s core business but some of our patients being discharged may experience this,” she said.

In response to this, our social work team pulled together a list of psychosocial services across the region and Hume Whittlesea Primary Care Partnership have taken it on to assist those who are isolated in the community. You can view the full directory here.

“Together is important for Northern Health as there is a real sense of satisfaction from working as a team and being driven by succeeding as a team. Working together is really rewarding and is applicable both within Northern Health and our external catchment,” Briana explained.

“We all have such critical and speciality skills to offer and it’s only when we put all the pieces of the puzzle together that our consumers can really thrive and have the best quality of life. We often think, as an acute health service, that we can do everything, but to ensure patients don’t deteriorate in the community, and reach their own goals, we need to remember that all parts of the system play a critical role,” Briana added.

“I wish I could tell staff that this pandemic will end soon but I can’t promise that – but I do believe that if we work together, we can get through this.”

Since the COVID-19 pandemic started, we have been extremely impressed by the response of all of our dedicated staff – who have all been model examples of how we incorporate one of our new values into our everyday work – Together.

This afternoon, Siva Sivarajah, Chief Executive, led a Virtual All-Staff Forum to provide an overview of the issues we are facing with COVID-19 as an organisation, and how our staff continue to meet and respond to these ongoing challenges.

“We continue to face many challenges, and have had to adapt our operations and learn how to work differently. But none of this would be possible without us supporting each other and working collaboratively together across the entire health service. All while we continue to provide the best possible care and treatment to our patients,” Siva added.

Over the past five months, Northern Pathology Victoria has completed over 58,000 tests and are registering up to 1,000 COVID-19 tests a day – an extraordinary accomplishment by many staff in different areas across Northern Health.

Our staff are working across multiple testing sites and three COVID-19 wards have been set up at Northern Hospital to care for positive patients who require inpatient care.

Staff members have stepped into new and different roles to assist in our response, undertaking additional training and learning new protocols, along with quickly implementing new models of care for our patients such as Telehealth.

“We’re very proud of our staff and how they are responding to the rapidly changing situation. Staff have been brilliant at being adaptable, flexible and patient – and continue to do the absolute best they can to care for our community,” Siva said.

“Every day, I see examples of our staff working safely, being kind to their patients and colleagues and working together,” Siva added.

We continue to work collaboratively with the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and provide support to local aged care facilities that are experiencing increasing COVID-19 cases. A number of our staff are working in these facilities to deliver care to residents and our Residential In-Reach team continue to step up and play a key role in helping manage this difficult situation.

Recently, our community services team launched a new telephone-based COVID-19 Positive Community Monitoring Program which provides expert support, guidance and medical advice to people within our local community.

“We extend our sincere thanks to all of our staff across Northern Health. Whether you are working in frontline clinical areas, wards, finance, allocations, front-of-house, support services or in administration – each and every one of you are playing an important role in helping us fight COVID-19 together,” Siva said.

“Please know – we see you, we appreciate you, and we are so very grateful.”

Collaborating with community organisations and research partners is a key focus for Northern Health, so we can continue to work together to create a healthier community.

La Trobe University researchers working to prevent premature births among socially disadvantaged and vulnerable women recently secured $1.6 million over four years from the Medical Research Future Fund’s “Preventative and Public Health Research” scheme.

La Trobe Professor of Midwifery, Helen McLachlan, received the funding to lead a randomised trial to explore whether caseload midwifery – offering continuity of care from a ‘known’ midwife to vulnerable women – can help reduce their substantially higher risk of preterm births.

The randomised trial will involve over 1,800 women and 10 midwives from three Victorian hospitals – Northern Health, the Royal Women’s Hospital and Bendigo Health.

Professor McLachlan said the innovative public health trial ultimately aims to prevent babies being born too early.

“Preterm birth is the most common cause of death in Australian infants. It also impacts on the short and long-term health of over 27,000 babies nationally each year, with much poorer health outcomes for vulnerable and disadvantaged mothers,” Professor McLachlan said.

She said caseload midwifery is associated with improved clinical and psychosocial outcomes for women, but it has been tested in mostly very low risk populations so far.

Debra Bourne, Northern Health Chief Nursing and Midwifery Officer, said, “Northern Health welcomes this incredible opportunity to work together with La Trobe University in this research project.”

“We are committed to offering caseload midwifery and, in the participation of this research project, will provide the support and partnership needed to get this important model in place for women and babies in our community,” Debra said.

La Trobe Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research and Industry Engagement) Professor Susan Dodds welcomed the funding.

“This is an investment in research that would have a lasting and meaningful impact on Australian families,” Professor Dodds said.

“La Trobe University is focused on research and teaching programs that bring about positive, tangible change. I am particularly proud that this work has been funded which will undoubtedly improve the lives of vulnerable women and their babies.”

This week, we have been looking at the second of our values – ‘Kind’, and how it helps us in ‘making a difference for every person, every day’.

As Deb Bourne, our Acting Chief Operating Officer explained, “When we treat our staff with kindness, we actually are saying…they are important and adding value and they make a difference when they come to work.”

“When we come to work and feel that way…it has a direct impact on patient care,” she adds.

We saw the creative ways compassion is being expressed at Northern Health through initiatives such as the Children’s Colouring Book launched by Narrun Wilip-giin (our Aboriginal Support Unit), and the COVID-19 Community Clinic.

The COVID-19 Community Clinic is not just providing medical assistance, but also bringing reassurance through a daily phone call to anxious patients self-isolating at home.

Kindness, as we stated in that iNews story, is central to our response to the pandemic, but as the following story shows, not the only instance where kindness has been on display at Northern Health.

Alecia Caddy, ANUM of Ward 2 (our Children’s Ward), tells how on a quiet afternoon, “I was in charge on a shift, where we had a patient, a little bub, who was unfortunately there on her own, as her mum was in a car accident. She had very minimal items of clothing – really only the clothes on her back.”

Along with her team, Alecia took it on herself to “get her a few bits of clothing and toys, and comfort things she would have had at home.”

“She was a happy little girl and we just wanted her to have some nice clothing,” says Alecia.

She adds, “It was really cute and nice to have been able to provide her some comfort.”

As Deb pointed out, “We treat our patients how we want to be treated – and really, in the end, we all want to be treated with kindness!”

So while we may be overwhelmed by what goes on around us, we do have a say in the choices we make each day and can bring kindness into the mix. Choose kindness today.