I would like to start this week by saying a huge thank you to colleagues who worked over the Bank Holiday weekend, whether that was working your usual shift or as part of our on call, out of hours response. I really appreciate the efforts you all make to ensure our patients and their loved ones are supported when they most need our care. I hope those of you who didn’t have to work over the weekend enjoyed the extra day off on Monday.

It has been another busy week here at NELFT. Last Thursday I had the pleasure of attending our public meeting of the Council of Governors, where I presented my Chief Executive’s update alongside presentations on our Audit Committee, staff survey results and of course an update from our acting Chair, Sultan Taylor. I was pleased to see so much engagement from our Governors, who represent staff groups, public and our partner organisations. Our Governors share their expertise and time with us voluntarily and we are very grateful for the work they do to help us improve as a Trust. Find out more about the Council of Governors.

I also attended our Charitable Funds Committee and it was great to hear about some of the work The Health Way Foundation has been supporting. This includes school holiday craft activities across our child and adolescent mental health services, World Book Day celebrations and activities for patients and even an electric piano to support therapeutic activities in our inpatient services in Kent. The Health Way Foundation is also supporting our May Movement Challenge in conjunction with our Health and Wellbeing team. If you would like to know more about The Health Way Foundation, click here.

It was our NELFT Admin Professionals Forum Week last week with lots of great sessions throughout the week, as well as the opportunity to mark Administrative Professionals Day on Wednesday. As well as recognising the amazing contribution of our administrative colleagues across NELFT, I would like to thank Alice Lush, my Executive Assistant, and Rebecca Duffy, Team Project Support and Personal Assistant to Deputy Chief Nurse and Director of Nursing, Essex & Kent, for all their hard work organising the week.

Thank you to our Research and Development team for putting on their brilliant annual conference last week and for inviting me to say a few words. The work carried out by our Research and Development team is very impressive and I would encourage to find out more about the active research projects that are currently taking place. Find out more about our Research Team.

As you know, we work hard to support colleagues and patients through our equality, diversity and inclusion work. Last week was Lesbian Visibility Week and the LGBT+ Network shared staff experiences, resources and information to raise awareness.  This week is Deaf Awareness Week and we have been sharing tips from the RNID (Royal National Institute for Deaf People) about how to communicate with someone who has hearing loss. Do check out our social media feeds to find out more. 

Take care and stay safe.

Jacqui

Jacqui Van Rossum
Chief Executive (Acting)