Queens Nurse, Liz Alderton, a Community Nurse Team Lead and Specialist Community Practice Teacher, based at the Harold Hill Health Centre in Havering received a British Empire medal (BEM) for services to nursing over the weekend.

No one made a difference quite like our Community Staff Nurse, Rose, who went away with not one, but two awards at our annual staff Make a Difference awards which celebrates our winners from 2019-2020.

We are delighted to announce the appointment of our new Executive Director of People and Culture. Simon Hart will join the Trust in December 2020. Simon was appointed following an in depth recruitment process that included a panel and two stakeholder groups. Colleagues from a range of roles and backgrounds across the Trust, as well as external partners, all formed part of the process. 

The Downshall Intergenerational Provision has been highly commended in the HSJ Value Awards 2020 for Mental Health Service Redesign.

The aim of the provision, which was launched by Dr David Hinchcliffe, NELFT Consultant Psychiatrist, is to provide a social hub that brings together older adult patients from NELFT’s Redbridge Older Adults Mental Health Team and Redbridge Memory Service as well as the children at Downshall Primary School.

In March we cancelled our Make a Difference staff awards ceremony as we began our response to COVID-19 – but we haven’t let the pandemic stop us celebrating our amazing colleagues. So we did it a little differently this year… 

The TIDEmark allows our organisation to measure progress in Equality, Diversity & Inclusion practice both year on year and in comparison with our peers.

NELFT has been assessed and scored across eight individual sections:

GCSE Results Day 2020 is on Thursday the 20th August for students in England and Wales. GCSE results are usually a nerve-wracking time for students, and even more so this year particularly as many exams were cancelled due to the Coronavirus pandemic and results will be based on predicted grades.

Every year, on the second Thursday of August, A Level students get their results. This year however, things are different due to the coronavirus pandemic. Sixth formers and college students who would normally have taken their A Level exams in May and June have had their results worked out by a new system.

Cycle to Work Day took place on Thursday 6^th August this year. The UK’s biggest cycle commuting event, Cycle to Work Day is all about encouraging people to give cycling a go – even if it’s just for one day, instead of driving or using public transport to get to work.

World Breastfeeding Week honours the August 1990 signing of the Innocenti Declaration by government policymakers, the World Health Organisation (WHO), UNICEF and other organisations. That document helped pave the way for protecting and supporting breastfeeding worldwide.

The most supportive organisations for Britain’s Armed Forces from both the private and public sectors have been announced today, 30 July 2020. We are delighted to be named as one of these organisations having been awarded the Employer Recognition Scheme Gold Award.

Could you make a difference to your local NHS?

At NELFT the views of our patients, local residents and staff are vital in ensuring that our services meet the needs of our communities now and in the future. If you would like to give your community a voice and help shape the services we deliver, nominate yourself to become a governor of our Trust.

Dr Mohan Bhat, our associate medical director and consultant old age psychiatrist, has highlighted his experience working in the NHS during the pandemic in a recent Eastern Eye article.

The Redbridge Talking Therapies team have produced a series of podcasts to help both staff and patients to develop their coping skills in these unprecedented and challenging times.