Thank You Event 2023: Making Stuff Better Award - Winner

Every year we celebrate our amazing staff and their achievements at our Thank You ceremony. Board members will surprise colleagues at their bases and present them with a hamper, balloons and a certificate for being shining examples of our magnificent staff behaviours.

Making Stuff Better Award - Winner

Podiatry Non-Registered Clinical Workforce

The Non-Registered Clinical Workforce was developed in order to manage the back log of patients following the pandemic and to address staff and system pressures in a solution focused method.

In conjunction with Leeds One workforce a pilot of number of Healthcare Support Workers were recruited to support the clinicians during clinics and home visits. This included meeting and greeting patients in the clinic room, prepping the clinical site at the beginning and throughout the day, assisting in health promotion with patients as indicated and directed by the podiatrist and stock monitoring, allowing the Podiatrists to focus on clinically related tasks /work.

Once the role was embedded, opportunities for developing their skills and responsibilities led to the Health Care Support Workers being trained to assist the Podiatrists during nail surgery, a task historically done by a Podiatry Assistant. This small change facilitated the service to increase the amount of nail surgery sessions offered each week, reducing waiting times and giving better access to patients that needed nail surgery. This new way of working meant Podiatry Assistant Practitioners were able to train and provide treatments which they had not done before e.g., shock wave and low risk post op nail surgery dressings, which helped to reduce waiting times for patients and reduce service and system pressure.

A new band 4 role clinical role was also then piloted to support Podiatrists in the treatment of patients with foot ulceration, providing wound cleansing using a new method that does not involve any sharp debridement, freeing up capacity with the Wound Care Podiatrist.

Bryan Machin, Executive Director of Finance and Resources surprised the team at Wooodhouse Health Centre to thank them saying, "Thank you all for your help and thank you on behalf of all the patients who are getting a better service and a faster service in the place they want it."

The Podiatry Non-Registered Clinical Workforce was nominated for the award by Marina Dunne, Podiatry Operational Team Manager. Marina said, “As result of the introduction of the Health Care Support Workers into the Podiatry service, we explored other new ways of working, looking at surrounding Trust models and innovative ways to provide high quality care to patients, whilst supporting staff health and wellbeing in a climate where we were finding it hard to recruit into vacant Podiatry posts.

This project in exploring and expanding our non-clinically registered workforce has allowed patients to be seen by the right person, right place, right time, resources are been allocated efficiently and effectively, improved patient experience which in turn has allowed the Podiatry service to reduce risk and improve safety within the care we provide to our patients.”