DDLMC WEEKLY UPDATE 30th July 2020
COVID-19 UPDATES
Isolation Period Extended to 10 Days. The UK Chief Medical Officers have announced that the self-isolation period has been extended to 10 days for those in the community who have coronavirus (COVID-19) symptoms or a positive test result. The full details are here.
Quarantine on return from Spain. The most frequently asked question this week has been whether practice staff need to quarantine for 14 days if they are returning from Spain. The current Gov.UK advice (from the Home Office, Border Force and UK Visa and Immigration) states that registered healthcare professionals are exempt. For practices this means GPs and Nurses would be exempt (no quarantine) but HCAs and admin staff wouldn’t (and would have to quarantine). However, we understand that PHE are keen to remove this exemption so please watch this space and if we hear anything different we will let you know as soon as we hear.
PPE Warning. A practice has notified us that they have discovered a quality control issue with a batch of aprons ordered through the PPE portal.
NATIONAL UPDATES
Flu Campaign 2020. You will all have seen the announcement about the extension of those eligible for a free flu vaccine to include 50-64 year old patients. We have received a number of queries but at this stage unfortunately have no more information on how this might be commissioned or the logistics behind it. Our advice at this stage is therefore to continue planning for the previously published cohorts and we will provide any updates as soon as we know. It is worth noting that the Government announcement did talk about the 50-64 cohort being offered the vaccine “later in the year” “once vaccination of the most ‘at-risk’ groups is well underway”.
LOCAL UPDATES
Primary Care Management of Suspected DVT. Derbyshire Shared Care Pathology Guidelines have been updated (Attachment A). Practices should note “The D-dimer test has a high false positive rate and is non-specific. It should NOT be used in primary care.”
e-RS. In the same way that general practice has changed the way that patients access services and are triaged before being seen, secondary care are also adapting. Although Choose and Book has been replaced by e-RS the name “Choose and book” accurately captured the concept which currently remains the same. However, the new way of triage may mean that simply changing the first appointment (that the patient has booked after referral) to a telephone call may not always be the best way forward. The newly formed primary/secondary care liaison group has now produced an updated proposal, affectionately termed “Choose and Not Book” (Attachment B) and any comments should be sent to Dr Kath Markus kath.markus1@nhs.net to inform the discussion
Respiratory Referrals to CRH. Dr Hal Spencer, Medical Director at CRH has asked us to share the following: “Due to our ongoing difficulties with getting pulmonary function testing (PFT) going due to COVID, I wondered if it would be possible for all referrals to Respiratory to include a copy of the latest spirometry (only if it has already been done in the Community). It would greatly help our service, possibly reduce the number of PFTs we need to request here and decrease the number of times we are individually having to get in touch with practices requesting this. Many thanks”
Medicines Management Website. The Clinical Policies and Decisions Team at DDCCG have asked us to share a survey designed to gain a better understanding of users' views of the Medicines Management website. They would like to gather information from users of the website to help refine and improve it and practices are requested to complete the short survey. https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/MedicinesManagementWebsite
Phlebotomy Appointments. The Pathology lab at CRH have asked us to share the following ‘We have had a number of instances today where patients have arrived at phlebotomy clinics without a request form, so we do not know what tests their GP has requested. I realise it can be problematic getting request forms to patients and we are working on an electronic solution but it is not in place as yet.
Please remind your patients they need to bring the request form to the phlebotomy clinic or we will not be able to collect the blood samples ‘
GP TASK FORCE DERBYSHIRE
**Attention for all new and aspiring GP Partners**
We are delighted to announce that GPTF are hosting the next cohort of our GP Partnership Development Programme.
This bespoke programme has been designed to cover different aspects of Partnership, including HR, Finance and Leadership.
To register your interest please follow the link .
Please see attached flyer (Attachment C) for programme details and registration requirements.
If you have further questions regarding the programme, please do not hesitate in contacting us and we will link you with one of the GP leads.
This programme has been funded by GPFV and commissioned by DDCCG.
All registrations must be completed by Sunday 16th August 2020.
GPTF GP Fellowships. GPTF have an exciting opportunity for a GP looking for something extra or for a practice looking to make a job opportunity more appealing. The Trailblazing fellowship will be focused on health inequalities and the full details are here .
OTHER UPDATES
Christmas. Further to our update two weeks ago can I just clarify:
The form needs to be sent to the CCG informing them of your intentions (not us at the LMC).
There is no deadline (other than 23rd December 2020!), but I would argue the sooner the better.
Practices/PCN will need to book the cover directly with DHU for the times they require.
Nottinghamshire Practice Nurse Recruitment Incident. Nottinghamshire LMC has made us aware of an individual impersonating an employed practice nurse colleague within Nottinghamshire and forwarding her cloned CV to practices. The impersonator is now understood to be operating outside Nottinghamshire and practices should be wary of any CV they receive from the email address nursekarenamies@outlook.com , which is believed to be a fake account. This matter has been reported to the Police by the practice and the victim involved. We would urge you to remain vigilant.