SURGERY NEWS
Anima
Anima is our new online service which will replace the eConsult service we currenlty use. Anima will be live from Monday 27th January and should be used for non-urgent/routine matters.
It works in a very similar way to eConsult and allows you to submit symptoms and general admin requests. The admin team will review requests and assign these appropriately.
To access the service patients need to register with Anima:
For repeat prescriptions please continue to use the NHS App or your normal ordering method.
Zero Tolerance
The NHS has a zero tolerance policy of all violence and aggression in order to protect its staff. The majority of patients behave in an acceptable and/or manageable way however the incidence of excessively aggressive or rude behaviour within the practice has increased.
As a practice, we recognise that there can be contributory reasons for patients behaving in a difficult or challenging manner, however, where this tips over into aggression or abusive language, the practice will adopt a zero tolerance approach.
Saxmundham Health aims to provide high quality healthcare and treat all patients with dignity and respect. In return, we expect all staff to be treated with respect. We will not tolerate abusive language or threatening behaviour against any member of staff.
We continue to try and increase capacity for patients and our staff continue to work extremely hard to facilitate all requests from patients.
What does my GP surgery do?
We would draw your attention to the below " GP Surgery Iceberg" as an overview of the increased workload and demands placed on a GP surgery.
Further to the diagram over the past 12 months we have seen a continued rise in workload and we wanted to draw patients to some of the highlights:
We have dealt with 37, 144 incoming letters/documents to process. An average of 150 per day for the admin team to process and pass to the GP to action/review.
We have dealt with 71,601 pathology/radiology results. An average of 291 per day for the admin team to process and for the GP to review/action.
We have offered 11,636 phlebotomy appointments. An average of 32 per day including hospital requests.
We have received 83,864 calls. An average of 341 per day.
We have 9500 registered patients. 7742 patients used a service at the surgery.
We had 76,829 appointments at the surgery. An average of 1477 appointments a week.
We had 1589 missed appointments. This equates to an average of 132 per month. This is 265 hours' worth of clinical time over the last 12 months. This is the equivalent to 33 days of GP hours across the year.
We remind everyone that missed appointments waste NHS resources and can cause serious delays in treatment for other patients.
GP's mental health plea for funding - Dr Havard EADT Article
Latest news
September 2023: Newsletter
Please read our September newsletter
August 2022: Newsletter
Please read our August Newsletter
News archive
January 2022: Newsletter
Please read our January Newsletter
July 2021: Saxmundham Newsletter
Health Data Opt Out Information (see below)
Using your Health Data for Planning and Research
Dr Havard has provided a short video with the latest information on our vaccination programme:
Getting your Covid-19 Vaccination at Saxmundham Health: A short video
Dr Havard Covid-19 Vaccination Update
Improving the care of patients in Care Homes during the Covid pandemic
Dr Havard and Suzie have been working on ways to improve the care of patients in Care Homes during the Covid pandemic.
Here is how they have been getting on
Dispensary: Behind the Scenes!
Please see our Dispensary: Behind the Scenes video.
Care Navigation: Behind the Scenes!
Please see our Care Navigation Behind the Scenes video
Saxmundham Health - Caring with a passion for continual improvement
So, what improvements have we made that make Saxmundham Health stand out from the crowd and provide you with a better service?
Mental Health
We are extremely fortunate that Suzanne has joined us as a senior Mental Health Nurse. Suzanne used to be the Team Leader for all the Suffolk GP Mental Health workers. We are proud to be the only Practice in the County that offers five days a week of mental health worker support (ten sessions). This appointment cements our unique service and emphasises just how important we feel mental health is. Local GP Surgeries only have half a day a week so we feel very fortunate to be leading the way. We have two Mental Health Nurses, Suzanne and Sarah who cover the whole week between them.
Nurse Consultant role
Suzie is a very experienced Consultant Nurse who has recently joined us in a new demanding role which we are still developing. Suzie has 25 years of experience in out of hours, emergency care, primary care and ambulance services. She has managed large units in big hospitals, including Trauma and Orthopaedics in Ipswich, and Emergency Care in Addenbrookes. Suzie has Master of Science qualification in Advanced Practice, and will lead on our staff education and training as well as doing clinical work. We are also starting to develop our research in Practice which will be exciting, and only right for a General Practice at the cutting edge.
Physiotherapy at Saxmundham Health
Prior to COVID I believe we were the only Practice offering five days a week of on-site Physiotherapy. Patients need urgent Physiotherapy assessments to ease pain and get back to normal activities. This cannot happen with long waits which can also make conditions more difficult to treat.
Using IT more
We have had some great successes with SHIFT (Saxmundham Health Intermittent Fasting Team) and, now Boris has pronounced on obesity, we will be bolder about taking this initiative forward. Please see this explanatory video called SHIFT which is about intermittent fasting.
Aside from this, we are also making a youtube video featuring three patients – two with pre-diabetes who have both lost over a stone (one nearly two stone) and one severe Type 2 has even now come off insulin. We want to celebrate their successes and use them to influence and encourage other patients. Tracey Riches our Diabetes Nurse Specialist has agreed to take part as she can make a powerful contribution from her experience with our diabetic patients - particularly as she has also lost over a stone herself!
We are also going to make a short video to explain to you, our patients, just why we are not back to normal yet and how we are obliged to follow the national guidance. This can be sent seamlessly while talking to you on the phone and will help us explain the current situation more fully.
We might even produce other short films to show you behind the scenes. It might be helpful for patients to witness the Dispensary checking processes and therefore understand why it takes time to deliver this service safely. We are always looking for ideas so please pitch in if you have got one or approach our PPG (Patient Participation Group).
Pharmacist support
Julia our Pharmacist has been with us for a year now and makes a massive difference in her patient contacts about medications. She came with a lot of Community Pharmacy experience which she still continues on a part-time basis alongside her commitment to us.
Phlebotomy
As the care of patients with chronic diseases increases we find the demand for blood testing also rises. Hospital patients are supposed to go to the hospital for their tests or Landseer Road in Ipswich but this is not always possible. We have just employed another Phlebotomist Sue who comes with many years experience from working at Woodbridge and she will doubtless make a swift impact.
Young person Mental Health
Young people often find it most difficult to access mental health support. For this reason we have developed posters about common mental health problems that affect young people like anxiety/depression with QR codes. The codes link to interviews with young people about their problem and what the treatment was like. We place these posters inside toilet doors so the QR codes can be accessed in private and then the films can also be viewed at a time of their choosing.
Research
We are always looking at how we do things and thinking about improvements to enhance the care of our patients. We are about to embark on a research project to improve care in Residential/Nursing Homes. The project involves Care Home staff using software we have had designed to assimilate a number of physiological measurements into a national score. These are things like pulse, respiratory rate, blood pressure etc and these are combined together to give a score. The Government has introduced weekly video ward rounds of Care Homes and we wanted to maximise the benefit of these. Clearly video can never be the same as face to face appointments but, if the consultation starts with systematically collected physical measurements, then we feel this should help identify early those patients who are becoming unwell. This is particularly important in patients with dementia as they may not be able to report if they feel unwell. Early identification should lead to prompter treatment and better outcomes - we will report our findings on the website.
Early on in the COVID outbreak it all became very scary after seeing what happened in Northern Italy and New Orleans. When the Government started building massive new hospitals it was clear we were facing a potentially massive crisis. There was speculation about 500,000 deaths which would have been particularly traumatic locally with our high percentage of elderly patients. The potential of full hospitals and looking after large numbers of dying patients at home was seriously worrying so we developed a strategy to help us cope should the predictions prove true. Fortunately they did not…..Our work was published in the Royal College Of General Practitioners Magazine.
Our Projects
Here at Saxmundham Surgery we are continuously striving to implement new projects which will have a beneficial effect on our patients and their health. Below are further details of some of our most recent projects.
