COVID RELATED INFORMATION

1. Important message from NHS Test and Trace regarding Domiciliary care test registrations (Information for home support and supported living providers)
2. National Vaccination booking site re-opening to health and social care workers on 19 April (Information for all care providers)
3. NHS England – Vaccinating people with a learning disability and autistic people podcast (Information for Care Home and Supported Living providers)
4. Government consultation launched – Making vaccination a condition of deployment in older adult care homes (Information for all care home providers)
5. Capacity Tracker - recent changes (information for all providers)
6. WMFS Safe and Well Update to Partners – COVID 19 (Information for all care providers in the West Midlands)
7. 7.Adult Social Care Infection Control and Testing Fund Ring-Fenced Grant 2021 (Information for all care providers with a CQC registered location in Birmingham)

IN OTHER NEWS

8. Birmingham Safeguarding Adults Newsletter (Information for all care providers operating in Birmingham)
9. Department of Health and Social Care – Care staff employment survey (Information for all providers)

COVID RELATED INFORMATION

1.Important message from NHS Test and Trace regarding Domiciliary care test registrations (Information for all home support and supported living providers)

Over the past few weeks, NHS Test and Trace have seen an 11% increase in the number of homecare workers correctly registering tests using the Unique Organisation Number (UON). Whilst the number of test kits being registered accurately has increased, there are still a significant number of test kits which are not being registered correctly.

We estimate a small amount of homecare workers are registering test kits via the light portal (registration portal which doesn’t require a UON). Therefore, we cannot trace this results to the homecare sector. To help clarify the registration journey our interactive registration one-page document can be found at:

Registering test kits for homecare workers (publishing.service.gov.uk)

We would greatly appreciate your continued support in reiterating the importance of registering kits and your help in encouraging homecare workers to register kits correctly.

Please continue to test regardless of the vaccine. It is vitally important that you continue to test regardless of whether you have had the vaccine or not. While the approved vaccines provide protection to a vaccinated person from becoming seriously ill from COVID-19, we do not yet know if they prevent someone from passing on the virus to others. You can still carry the virus on your body and clothes if you come into contact with it.

All staff still need to follow the guidance in your workplace, including wearing the correct personal protection equipment and undertaking regular testing to continue to protect themselves, the people you care for, your family, friends and colleagues. Please continue to promote the importance of testing to your staff.

2.National Vaccination booking site re-opening to health and social care workers on 19 April (Information for all care providers)

The self-referral route for frontline eligible health and social care workers will be reinstated on the National Booking System by 19 April. When using the online or telephone service, social care workers will need to self-declare at the point of booking and will be asked for identification and written authorisation when they attend their vaccination appointment. Appropriate forms of identification include a work photo ID card, authorisation letter from the local authority, a signed letter of authorisation from their employer or wage slip that is dated within the last 3 months. The relevant documents can be found below:

National COVID-19 Vaccination Booking System

Vaccination booking forms and letters

3.NHS England – Vaccinating people with a learning disability and autistic people podcast (Information for Care Home and Supported Living providers)

NHS England would like to share a link to their new podcast:

Vaccinating people with a learning disability and autistic people.

NHS England want to continue to support colleagues within local systems in the vaccination of people with a learning disability and autistic people in an at risk group. This podcast features our National Clinical Director, Roger Banks in conversation with one of our Family/Carer Advisors, Fazilla Amide, whose 17 year old son has complex health needs, learning disability and autism. The podcast provides advice and support around good communication, the range of reasonable adjustments that should be considered and issues around anxiety and needle phobia. As well as providing some specific examples of good practice. This continues to be important as we move towards giving people their second dose of the Covid vaccination.

4.Government consultation launched – Making vaccination a condition of deployment in older adult care homes (Information for all care home providers)

The Government have launched a 5 week consultation making COVID vaccination a condition of work for people who are deployed in older adult care homes. Please find attached a letter from the Department of Health and Social Care inviting care home providers and managers to take part in the consultation. Further information can be found here;

Consultation launched on staff COVID-19 vaccines in care homes with older adult residents

Making vaccination a condition of deployment in older adult care homes

5.Capacity Tracker - recent changes (information for all providers)

With a further £341m to support social care providers with infection control and testing measures, it is vital that you continue to update the capacity tracker at least weekly. Please ensure all sections have saved successfully when you are updating the Capacity Tracker.

Dose 2 COVID Vaccinations questions to be added evening of 15 April

Now that dose 2 vaccinations are well underway in a number of places, the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) are asking you to begin supplying information on this through the Capacity Tracker. Questions will go live on the evening of Thursday 15 April. Please also use this opportunity to ensure your dose 1 information is up to date.

There will only be one new question item which builds upon the Covid vaccination first dose question you are currently completing;

• For care home providers this will ask how many residents and how many staff (by role type) are known to have received the second dose of the vaccine.
• For home care providers this will ask how many staff are known to have received the second dose of the vaccine.

This data is essential for informing the government’s policy in relation to vaccination in the care sector and the DHSC really value your help in completing this data and ensuring its accuracy.

Please contact Capacitytracker-guidance@dhsc.gov.uk if you need further guidance on how to enter your vaccination data into Capacity Tracker.

Changes to Workforce Absence within Business Continuity for Care Homes and Hospices

The collection of absence data for workforce contained within the daily business continuity has been amended so that now only directly employed staff that are absent due to Covid-19 (suspected or confirmed) or are absent due to sickness (non Covid-19 related) are now captured within these fields.

New provider access to reports functionality and provider drop in sessions

From the evening of Monday 12 April Capacity Tracker data has been made available to all provider groups giving reports at organisation level and National level.  A new report; Comparative Analysis, will allow users to view their location data against a local or regional geographical data set.

There are scheduled sessions (meeting links below), for ALL Provider types during April. These will provide the opportunity to go through the new functionality and benefits this new access will bring providers, as well as the opportunity to ask questions about the changes.

Capacity Tracker Provider Drop In Session 1 – 15/04/2021 2pm to 2:45pm

Capacity Tracker Provider Drop In Session 2 – 16/04/2021 2pm to 2:45pm

Capacity Tracker Provider Drop In Session 3 – 20/04/2021 10am to 10:45am

Capacity Tracker Provider Drop In Session 4 – 22/04/2021 10am to 10:45am

Capacity Tracker Provider Drop In Session 5 – 26/04/2021 2pm to 2:45pm

Capacity Tracker Provider Drop In Session 6 – 28/04/2021 2pm to 2:45pm

Further information about the above changes will be published on the Resource Centre, What’s New section of the Capacity Tracker

National Capacity Tracker log in

If you need any assistance with the Capacity Tracker, the Support Team are available on 0191 691 3729, alternatively you can email necsu.capacitytracker@nhs.net

6.WMFS Safe and Well Update to Partners – COVID 19 (Information for all care providers in the West Midlands)

  West Midlands Fire Service continue to offer free "Safe and Well" assessments for those most at risk of fire throughout the Covid-19 pandemic, so please continue to refer to us using your organisation’s usual method. If you’re unsure how to refer to us or want to set up a new referral pathway please get in touch at:  partnership.vulnerability.team@wmfs.net

Covid risk-assessed home visits are still available for individuals that our data shows are most at risk of dying or being seriously injured in a fire: namely, people who live alone and meet two of the following additional risk factors: 

• Smoking 
• Drug or alcohol dependency 
• Medical oxygen and/or an airflow mattress use 
• A sensory impairment (e.g. sight, hearing) 
• Poor mobility 
• Have had a fire previously * 
• Victim of hate crime * 
• Hoarding * 
• Mental health condition (including dementia) * 

 *Where these risks are present, when referring please include any of these four risk factors in the ‘Comments’ section of your referral, as this will help us triage more effectively during the Covid pandemic. 

For those at lower risk, and to play our part in helping reduce Covid-19 transmission, we will instead look to conduct remote assessments by telephone or using our viewing app "999eye".   

As COVID restrictions are eased, to provide a focused and targeted response to your referrals based on risk and vulnerability, remote assessments will continue as a response to referrals where risk is lower, and it is appropriate to do so. 

7.Adult Social Care Infection Control and Testing Fund Ring-Fenced Grant 2021 (Information for all care providers with a CQC registered location in Birmingham)

The Adult Social Care Infection Control Fund was first introduced in May 2020. It was extended in October 2020 and, by March 2021 had provided over £1.1 billion of ring-fenced funding to support adult social care providers in England for infection prevention and control (IPC). The Rapid Testing Fund was introduced in January 2021 to support additional lateral flow testing (LFT) of staff in care homes, and enable indoors, close contact visiting where possible.

Due to the success of the Infection Control Fund and the Rapid Testing Fund in supporting care providers to reduce transmission and re-enabling close contact visiting, the government has announced that these funding streams have been consolidated and extended until June 2021, with an extra £341 million of funding. You can read further details about the grant on the government website:

Adult social care infection control and testing fund

The Council is working through the process of administering and distributing the grant, and we shall issue further updates and instructions via this weekly bulletin.

IN OTHER NEWS…

8.Birmingham Safeguarding Adults Newsletter (Information for all care providers operating in Birmingham)

We are very pleased announce the e-publication of our Spring Newsletter. We hope you find this informative.

THE BSAB SPRING NEWSLETTER

Birmingham Safeguarding Adults Board

9.Department of Health and Social Care – Care staff employment survey (Information for all providers)

DHSC are looking for care colleagues, in employment or looking for work, to complete a short survey, as part of their work in understanding how they find employment. The results will help them evaluate the best methods to reach job-seekers who want to work in care. Please share this anonymous survey with care colleagues by clicking the link below. It should take no longer than ten minutes to complete.

DHSC would also like job-seekers to take part in one-to-one interviews on this topic. To find out more, contact:   shelley.evitt@nhs.net

Complete the care staff employment survey