Q Exchange
Competence, Confidence and Complex Needs Children
- Winning idea
- 2022
Meet the team
Also:
- Julianne Lee Lead Nurse Community Children’s Nursing
- Una Hughes – Children's Training Co-Ordinator
What is the challenge your project is going to address and how does it connect to the theme?
To enable children requiring nursing tasks, e.g. enteral feeding, tracheostomy care and home ventilation to be cared for safely, carers require appropriate knowledge, clinical skills, competence and confidence to safely perform care delegated to them.
Our project will strengthen and transform our training model optimising collaboration across health, education and community settings; promoting children’s full participation in family, school and community life. Feedback from all stakeholders has been extremely positive.
The challenges our project will address are:
- Delayed hospital discharge and admissions to school and community groups
- Accuracy of competency records – currently, paper based and dependent on manual update.
- Trigger when a competency review is required.
- Time pressures.
- Lack of Flexibility within current system.
- User Engagement.
- Continuity, consistency and impartiality of testing of knowledge.
- Difficulty releasing Health Care Worker’s (HCW) and Classroom Assistants (CA) to attend training/annual updates.
- Risk of infection spread when large groups gather.
- Information Governance
What does your project aim to achieve?
Our aim is to ensure just-in-time training required for the safe care of children with nursing needs at home, school and community settings is engaging, easily accessible and expedites integration.
We provide training to 136 carers including HCWs, CAs, childminders, foster carers and community workers. This training supports 58 Children.
We want to:
- Expedite hospital discharge and transition into school and community groups
- Digitally mirror currently provided training, reflect agreed procedures, and link to generic and child specific competencies
- Provide virtual training 24/7 to suit carers, supporting work-life balance; backed up by face-to-face practical demonstrations
- Provide inclusive, intuitive, meaningful just-in-time training making on-the-go learning a flexible and accessible reality
- Provide real-time competency database, with inbuilt triggers to ensure training and competencies are always in date
- Save time/money; reduce travel; improve time-management of current training model.
- Utilise existing Learning Management Systems (LMS)
- Breakdown silos and increase sharing
- Reduce environmental impact
How will the project be delivered?
It will be delivered in partnership with children on the Community Children’s Nursing (CCN) caseload, their parents, trust staff, education staff and workers/volunteers in community settings.
The funding will allow backfill for our Children’s Training Co-ordinator (CTC), an expert in delivering our competency based training programme and collaboration with a digital design partner to support successful development of our digital training.
- CTC, Lead CCN and QI Team will lead the project to ensure effective management and communication
- We will engage users to inform development, test and evaluate the digital training
- Continuous feedback/audit is key in measuring and defining impact and advancement of the platform
- Early delivery of a prototype, intuitive development with users, and expertise within the project group will mitigate potential risks
The project will deliver value for money as an efficient and effective model for training, reducing time in hospital, and travel/training time, ultimately benefiting children and families.
How is your project going to share learning?
All CCN teams provide competency based training, and there is significant interest in a digital solution, to what is currently a manual process for all CCN teams in Northern Ireland and many teams providing care to children with nursing needs in other regions.
We will share the learning locally, regionally and nationally through Q and CCN teams across Ireland and the UK. We will use our links with Public Health Agency, paediatric teams, Education Authority and parent/community groups to support spread.
There is capacity for future expansion of the platform to recognise transferable knowledge and skills and incorporate Regulated Qualifications Framework (RQF) evidence.
Our idea could equally be adapted for use in other paediatric services and adult care.
We will be active on Twitter and our Trust Facebook page, promoting and sharing our learning.
Having project team members who are previously published, we will write-up our work for academic publication.
How you can contribute
- We are really keen to hear from anyone with experience in developing digital training platforms
- Could you point us to any resources that would support our project
Plan timeline
| 30 May 2022 | Engagement and Identification of Stakeholders. |
|---|---|
| 29 Jun 2022 | Engage Stakeholders to identify and review teaching content and competencies |
| 3 Jul 2022 | Identification and commissioning of digital partner |
| 30 Aug 2022 | Prototype development and development of evaluation strategy (including measurement) |
| 10 Oct 2022 | Complete initial PDSA testing of training/competency platform |
| 7 Nov 2022 | Evaluate and refine platform |
| 5 Dec 2022 | Adapt and re-test platform |
| 16 Jan 2023 | Evaluate testing phases |
| 1 Mar 2023 | Prepare training for use of platform and launch |
| 9 Apr 2023 | Launch training/competency platform |
Project updates
17 Aug 2023
We believe this project transforms competency based training for carers of children who require interventions such as enteral feeding, tracheostomy care and home ventilation by being current and available 24/7. It will help carers to acquire appropriate knowledge, clinical skills, competence and confidence in delivering child specific delegated care. The project embraces technological innovation and is transferable to many other services and disciplines in both children’s and adult care. We believe our learning, especially in relation to data protection will be helpful for other Q Members working on other similar projects.
We are passionate about providing education and training to parents, Classroom Assistants and Health Care Workers to ensure that children with nursing needs can grow and develop in their own communities with safe, effective care, underpinned by engaging up-to-date, easily, accessible training and resources.
19 Jan 2023
Since we were awarded the QExchange funding we have been very busy, liaising with schools, parents and community nursing teams to bring together a stakeholder group, who would inform our decisions and guide the project to ensure we were meeting their needs.
We identified 7 initial topics that we want to concentrate on to get the project up and running. The topics cover the most frequently required nursing interventions for children with complex needs.
A survey was created to gauge interest in online learning. We investigated the Learning Management system (LMS) employed within the Trust but discovered that it would not meet our needs, so we reached out to local businesses to investigate the LMS they used. This lead us to the one we are currently testing.
We started populating a Life QI folder with all our information, Process maps and Driver diagrams and investigated different ways of making the theory training accessible to everyone.
Measuring and capturing data on the improvements proved challenging, as everyone rearranges their time so that children do not miss school or have delayed hospital discharge, however we decided to monitor the additional hours nurses spent providing extra training, outside the set training days.
Collation of video resources that are freely available was commenced in preparation for sharing on the LMS under the set topics.
A poster was prepared for a Trust Quality Improvement event. Action Learning Set days and QExchange Evaluation sessions were all attended which helped to provide protected time to think about the project and discuss it with others who had similar issues.
Information Governance and Cyber security were invited to become involved to ensure all data being processed would be secure and the Trust were satisfied with security details, this is an ongoing process. Pending their approval, a subscription to a cloud based LMS will commence and uploading of content can begin. This has caused some delay in our project but we are able to work on the preparation of resources while this is scrutinised.
Animation software has been identified, one animated training video was produced and disseminated among the stakeholder group. Feedback was very positive with only a request to use the normal presenter’s voice and commencement of storyboarding and production of more videos is about to begin.
We’ve learned a lot on the journey, including how the quality improvement process works and the absolutely incredible value of stakeholder involvement, not to mention the ability to create animated videos!
We would love to hear from anyone in the Q Community who has experience of working with information governance and cyber security when using a cloud based system within the NHS, particularly in Northern Ireland.
We have outlined our timeline, PDSA Cycles and next steps in the PowerPoint below.
A brief overview is included in the Poster and an example of our sample video animation is included.
Comments
Alex Lee 30 May 2022
Parents/carers are an important undervalued resource which, if appropriately empowered and supported, provides the best care for the individual child.
Una Hughes 31 May 2022
We couldn't agree more Alex, parents are the experts in knowing their child, that's why co-production has to be at the heart of this project.
Una
Joanne Beckmann 21 May 2022
Great to see this idea posted and shortlisted! #CommPaedRocks!
What platforms are you planning to use? And are these any more accessible than eg. YouTube or other non-few paying platforms?
Would be interested to collab and link up!
Una Hughes 23 May 2022
Hi Joanne, it sounds as though you have the same enthusiasm for Community Paediatrics as we have!! Thank you for getting in touch.
We would love to chat about our ideas and share the information.
We want to keep a live database of users who have completed the training on line, we are trying to choose a platform which will allow everyone to access it for no or minimal cost, otherwise it won’t be used. As we want to include healthcare staff, education staff and parents this is not straightforward, any insight or ideas on how to do this would be great.
We could set up a Zoom? My email is una.hughes@southerntrust.hscni.net, let me know if that would suit.
Una Hughes
Una Hughes 3 May 2022
We are very excited and feel honoured that our project has been short listed, we’ve been working away in the interim to try to progress our idea. We have had such positive feedback from everyone this will impact on locally and really hope we can bring this project to fruition with support from the Q Community, which has been really beneficial so far. We look forward to sharing our learning journey with the Q Community and further afield.
Una
Thomas John Rose 22 Mar 2022
I can recommend https://www.futurelearn.com/ as a learning platform. They already run a number of healthcare courses.
Una Hughes 4 May 2022
Hi Thomas, we followed up on your suggestion and contacted FutureLearn. We have completed courses through FutureLearn in the past and were very impressed with it, however after discussing our project with their Partnership Manager, she and I both felt the FutureLearn Platform didn’t meet all our needs. We really appreciate the suggestion and your advice, any further guidance is welcomed.
Una
Julianne Lee 22 Mar 2022
Project Update
We are deeply appreciative all of the positive feedback, encouragement and support we have received from such a variety of professionals in health, education, research, QI and from parents of children with complex needs and their carers.
The expertise and experience of the Q community and the learning that has been shared with us from its members and previous Q Exchange winners has been invaluable in developing and shaping our idea into a final proposal. We have learnt so much in terms of how to build on previous projects, how best to engage with parents and carers and the digital capability, which is available. We are delighted to have made so many new links in the last few weeks locally, regionally, nationally and with the wider Q community.
Collaboration and co-creation is essential for the future of this project. We will build on our existing engagement with all stakeholders including digital innovators across a variety of sectors to support us to enable the project to reach its full potential. We are actively investigating utilisation of Learning Management Systems (LMS) within the NHS, which would potentially negate the information governance issues identified and be a cost effective way to deliver our training.
We want to break down silos and share information to support ‘just-in-time’ training, reshaping education and competency based training by integrating digital learning; providing it in physical and virtual platforms; increasing accessibility and improving work-life balance. We believe the project has significant transferability and will benefit the Q community across the UK and Ireland.
Our ultimate aim is to promote confidence, competence and safe delegation for carers of children with complex needs, supporting their integration in school, community and home life in as timely a manner as possible.
Thank you to all who have commented on our project.
Julianne, Una & Gerard
Grace Hamilton 22 Mar 2022
Fantastic project building on the already great work done by this service to meet the needs of CYP, improve outcomes and enhance quality of life. Im happy to support this project in any way we can - particularly around user feedback - have you considered how the online user feedback platform care opinion could be beneficial here?
good luck - looking forward to hearing the outcomes of your work
Julianne Lee 22 Mar 2022
Thank you Grace for your positive feedback, offer of support and suggestion of using Care Opinion as a means of receiving User Feedback. This is a great idea and one, which we will explore. We look forward to sharing the outcomes of our project.
Deirdre Grant 22 Mar 2022
This is a fantastic idea which will enhance and modernise the existing training provided and give greater autonomy to the groups of staff that require training.
As a CCN I am fully aware of the challenges on all teams of releasing staff for training. Having 24/7 access to a training suite will be hugely beneficial and prevent/reduce disruption to services, reduce delays to hospital discharges and allow staff to access refresher training as needed.
I can envision other areas wanting to replicate this!
Julianne Lee 22 Mar 2022
Hi Deirdre, thank you for taking the time to comment. We believe that through being able to provide training on a digital platform will address the challenges teams and services face releasing staff for training and address the lack of flexibility within our current training model. As you say other areas will be interested in replicating our idea and project proposal.
Adrian Cluett 22 Mar 2022
Great looking project to improve care for children and support those who care for them using a digital platform, happy to link in and help where I can.
Julianne Lee 22 Mar 2022
Thank you Adrian for you comment and offer of support. We look forward to linking with you and learning from your digital expertise and experience.
Jean McCracken 22 Mar 2022
This is a timely and well planned project which will improve learning and skills for everyone supporting children and young people with complex health care needs. Embracing the remote learning model has many benefits for carers' and support staff but the child is the biggest beneficiary. Early discharge and ongoing support in the home and community promotes positive outcomes for the whole family.
I can envisage many opportunities to extend this project plan within specialist children's nursing services and look forward to more collaborative working.
Very best wishes Julianne and Una in the progression of this exciting project.
Julianne Lee 22 Mar 2022
Hi Jean, Thank you for your positive feedback and encouraging comments. The opportunities to collaborate and extend this project plan within specialist children's nursing services and further afield are immense.
Claire Chapman 22 Mar 2022
What a great idea to have all current policies, procedures and training materials available for staff to access in a digital form. As a CCN involved in the training of staff in schools and the children's homes, I think this is a very innovative idea which would not only assist staff requiring training to access the materials when and where is most appropriate for them, but would also mean staff assessing competencies would have easy access to training records and other relevant material, ensuring this is carried out in a timely manner. We have recently seen the benefits within our team of digital technology for record keeping and this can only further enhance the experience, not only for community children's nursing, but possibly for other nursing teams. It will also ensure we continue to maintain high standards of safe and effective care and avoid delays in caring for children in the home and school setting. Well done to all involved.
Julianne Lee 22 Mar 2022
Hi Claire, thank you for taking the time to comment. It will be so beneficial to have training materials and training records available in a digital platform. The impact of ensuring training can be completed as and when required will ultimately ensure children will be able to be discharged from hospital and able to access school and community groups in a more timely manner.
Sharon McCloskey 22 Mar 2022
Thank you for sending me the link to this exciting project and for providing the opportunity to comment.
As a children's nurse with experience both in community children's nursing and in children's hospice care, I am acutely aware of the complex needs many children within community children's nursing caseloads possess and that parents and those supporting the child are undertaking care 'tasks' that require high levels of skill and monitoring. Some children require others to be constantly vigilant as they are vulnerable to a catastrophic life threatening event which requires immediate intervention.
As mentioned above, these children require a team of trained family and staff members to enable them to avail of school, leisure activities and breaks. Additionally, some of these children will have conditions that will likely shorten their lives. Access to family time and other childhood experiences such as school should not be prolonged through protracted training programmes which result in delayed discharge from hospital or participation in school. This is currently often the case.
We expect a lot of staff who take on such care. Supporting them and assisting them to develop their knowledge, skills, confidence and competence is important to for the child's safety and quality of life and also for the safety and wellbeing of the carer.
It is lovely to read how this team is planning to address what has proved a challenging reality for services across NI and wider afield. I can envisage how the digital platform alongside supportive 'in person' learning will enrich this experience for the reasons identified in the project brief. It will also enable learners to refresh their learning when they feel this will be of benefit rather than waiting for their next scheduled competency review. I would suggest that building in measures of praise and positive reinforcement into the online assessment process could be affirming and confidence building for learners, especially for those who are taking on the care of children with complex needs for the first time. I can also see how the digital platform will enable prompt access to new learning when a child's needs change.
I suggest that careful attention to outcome and impact measures will be important to assess change from the current baseline.
In terms of links that might be helpful:
1) Dr Patricia McNeilly, QUB is a children's nurse and has led on children's palliative care education and learning. Patricia, working with colleagues in Queens has developed innovate on-line learning platforms.
2) Northern Ireland Social Care Council: this council has a range of award winning, on line digital learning resources.
3) WellChild charity: The education and skills development of family and carers has been a core remit of its work.
I wish this project every success
Una Hughes 22 Mar 2022
Hi Sharon, thank you for taking the time to read our proposal and for your positive comments. You are absolutely right, that we must carefully assess the impacts and outcomes of our project; piloting our system and auditing the results, will help us to monitor the benefits and pitfalls, along with incidental benefits which may occur, e.g. decreased stress on individuals travelling to training, cost of travel and parking. We are very aware of the need for digital accessibility equity and how this may impact on availability of training for some.
The links you have suggested are very useful and we will follow up on these; we have already been in contact with Dr Patricia McNeilly and are keen to learn from her experiences. The Wellchild and NISCC are brilliant resources and we will also connect with them.
Thank you for signposting us to these potential supporting individuals and resources.
Regards
Una
Rosie Mulholland 21 Mar 2022
As a CCN involved in the Community Children’s Service since its inception in the SHSCT, I have witnessed the transformational impact that the delegation of care has had for children and their families; children with the most complex healthcare needs, and their families, have been enabled and empowered to live at home and access other community settings such as schools, creche’s, youth clubs and children and young people’s services/projects. Competency based training has been the cornerstone in ensuring a high standard of safe, quality care and enhanced the development of sensitivity and insight of the needs of children and their families in the community . The transition to a digital learning platform will augment the comprehensive competency based training already embedded in practice. A digital platform will provide the flexibility of access from any location at any time, be available ‘just in time’ and be used ongoing for learning and for reference, provide consistency in the delivery of training and allow for updating in content. Not only will the move from paper to digital ‘save the planet’, it will enhance efficiency and efficacy of training, reduce costs in terms of time, travel and documentation and potentially reduce the time taken to deliver the learning content. Engaging and seeking contribution from all stakeholders is imperative to the success of any design and I am delighted to see the multiplicity of input in this project. The versatility in being able to roll the database out for multi-professional use is another significant benefit which will further enhance the delivery of care to children and their families. I envisage that this project will be a win-win situation for all stakeholders; the educators, the professionals delegating care, the carers (formal and informal) and most importantly the children and young people who are the recipients of the augmented care provision. I welcome the development of this initiative, but am wondering, given the various learning styles of individuals, is there going to be incorporation of adaptive learning functionality in which the platform can dynamically change the training based on the individual carers performance?
Una Hughes 21 Mar 2022
Hi Rosie, it is wonderful to get such positive feedback from someone who has worked in this field from its inception in the Trust. We totally agree that 24/7 accessibility will enhance the ability to provide just-in-time training and act as a valuable reference resource.
Adaptive learning functionality would be a very welcome and interesting concept to enhance everyone’s learning experience. A training platform that dynamically changes according to the users performance to support their learning style may be beyond our reach from a financial point of view, however, we aim to counterbalance this with the face-to-face practical demonstrations and assessment.
We are not doing away with face-to-face support, merely adding a digital dimension to the support we currently provide. The pandemic has really changed the way we all interact with services around us and this is an opportune time to diversify and develop our teaching resources. Research demonstrates that learners value the opportunity to go back and look at online resources to check their knowledge and understanding, something they cannot do if they only have an in-person teaching session.
We really look forward to exploring all the ways this approach can be used to enhance competence and confidence in carers of children with complex needs and to apply this in many other settings and groups of patients.
Thank you for your comments
Una
Elizabeth Smyth 21 Mar 2022
This is a very worthwhile project. As an educator in the field of medicines management I can see that digital innovation is the way forward. This will ensure safety and governance for the children under your care. It will also ensure staff are skilled and confident to provide care.
I wish you all the best.
Elizabeth
Julianne Lee 21 Mar 2022
Hi Elizabeth, thank you for taking the time to comment on our project. As an educator in medicine management, it is great to get your views. We hope to include a learning module on our digital platform on medicine management replicating the current training material we provide in this area.
Michele Bekmez 21 Mar 2022
This innovative project will undoubtedly improve the outcomes for young children/people and their families, staff and SENs etc. while enabling staff to be freed up in the long term.
There is huge opportunity for the project to potentially bring in a postgrad student with digital technology expertise and afford them the opportunity to work alongside project leads to help maximise the direction of this project in developing the digital capabilities needed to make this a success. The possibilities are endless and the opportunity to work with digital innovators across a variety of sectors to support the project should be explored to enable project to reach its full potential.
There a incidental financial and environmental benefits from the project in reducing the need for travel, use of transport and its impact on the environment, parking fees and travel time and stress that can be factored into the findings as indirect benefits. Using a digital platform to provide the training can also provide the ability to ‘watch again’ versus the stress of trying to take everything in during one singular training session if required. The use of a blended approach will be a huge support and while this may not suit everyone as we have learned during the pandemic, digital solutions are a vital component enabling alternatives to traditional methods of teaching and service provision. The learning has also taught us that equality of access can be a barrier that we need to explore and sensitively approach in the roll out of all technology enabled reform and this project will serve as a learning platform for other programs and has significant transferability to other services. Indeed some of the training can also be used in other sectors as key learning in use of various types of equipment for users of all ages for example the use of peg or enteral feeding etc.
The ability to use a digital alternative will no doubt be welcome by SENs, parents / carers alike to enable them to avail of the training at a time suitable to their needs so the project will be a win for everyone. Well done to all involved and looking forward hearing the shared learning as the project develops.
his innovative project
Una Hughes 21 Mar 2022
Hi Michele, Thank you for taking the time to comment on our project, you have listed the incidental financial and environmental benefits exactly as we had envisioned. We think a blended approach to teaching and learning helps everyone to engage and find a style that suits them. Equality of access is a factor we have considered and will get a better idea of the extent this will affect our training platform during testing and through involvement of all stakeholder groups.
I am intrigued by your thoughts on involving a postgrad student with digital expertise, I will email you to discuss this idea further. We have linked up with the newly appointed digital Chief Nurse within the Trust and will discuss this possibility with him also.
We agree with you and can see so many possibilities for the use of digital training in many areas of healthcare and look forward to sharing the learning of our journey.
Regards
Una
Brian McGowan 21 Mar 2022
This is a great idea: the development of a reusable, flexible, online resource will enable staff to better use the time they spend with families and children. Have a read at ideas around the 'flipped classroom'. Make sure you record the process you've engaged in to develop this so that you can publish and others can benefit from it. Good luck.
Brian
Una Hughes 21 Mar 2022
Hi Brian, thank you for your positive comments; on your advise I've been looking at the 'flipped classroom' and can see how the blended approach we want to take with digital theory and face-to-face practical sessions can really benefit learners.
We are carefully documenting our design and thought processes with the aim to publishing the learning gained during our journey. We have learned so much already since our involvement in Q Exchange.
Thank you for your support
Una
Deborah Orr 18 Mar 2022
A fantastic idea, making life so much easier as a health care worker who isn't always in the office. Being able to access this information anywhere is fab. We'll thought out and planned
Julianne lee 19 Mar 2022
Hi Deborah, thank you for your positive comments. Accessibility of training materials from a pesonal device at a time that suits you will make such a difference. We will be working closely with our Health Care Workers as we strive to bring this project forward.
Regards, Julianne
Leeza O’Brien 18 Mar 2022
What a fantastic idea. It will be great opportunity for health and education in particular to collaborate for those with special educational needs and to ensure consistency in training for parents, carers, teachers etc Information governance can sometimes be an issue between education and health, so that may be something to think about.
Best of luck with the project!
Julianne Lee 19 Mar 2022
Hi Leeza, thank you for taking the time to comment on our project. The collaboration with the Education Authority, our local Special Schools and the mainstream schools where children with complex health needs attend are key to the success of this project with co-design a priority. The consistency in training an online platform will offer has to be welcomed by all. As you say, information governance between education and health may be a challenge. We plan to involve and engage both governance teams within our Trust and the Education Authority to seek solutions to overcome any governance challenges the project may face.
Siobhan Butler 18 Mar 2022
This is a great proposal that really has huge potential. Parents are expected to take on so many clinical tasks without the level of training healthcare professionals receive. We should be providing them with the tools to feel empowered to care for there child safely within the home.
Una Hughes 20 Mar 2022
Hi Siobhan, we have been introduced to the videos you mentioned in your previous response and linked up with so many supportive individuals by entering the Q Exchange program: which just proves how useful this process is.
We think the gastrostomy videos are a great resource and we think our project can add to this. We are meeting Bethan to discuss how we can help each other. We value input from parents and it is great getting both the parents and healthcare professionals point of view to help our unregistered HCWs and CAs. We have had very positive comments from all stakeholders in this project. Ultimately we want to improve the lives of children with complex needs and allow their carers to be competent and confident. We agree with you that there is so much potential for this and appreciate your comments.
Una
Grace Stewart 18 Mar 2022
HI Julie Anne thanks for sending this. What a brilliant innovation.This project has the capacity to make a real difference to children and families.
We use an online platform for some of our training in NICH and back it up with a competency assessment. If there is anything that we can do to help in anyway please come back. Excellent improvement - well done.
Julianne Lee 19 Mar 2022
Hi Grace, thank you for taking the time to comment on our project. Digital enabled training will support accessibility and consistency and ultimately make a difference for the children and families in our care. Would be keen to link with you regarding how you use an online platform to support your competency training at the Northern Ireland Childrens Hospice.
Will be in touch,
Julianne
Aveen Armstrong 17 Mar 2022
As a parent of a child who has accessed support from the CCN Team and as an educationalist working within the SEN sector for many years, I am delighted to hear of the proposals outlined in this exciting project. Use of a digital platform to provide training to Health Care and Education staff will create a much more efficient and flexible mode of delivery, enabling staff to access training at any stage of the year and at a time which is convenient to their work setting. This will bring great benefits to both staff and the children they work with. Having the capability to train staff in this manner should cut down on any delays in its provision as it will be readily accessible. Many staff require training and staffing personnel working with children can often change. Use of a digital training platform will ultimately enable children to access the medical and educational services/ provision they require in a more timely manner and will provide confidence for their families and carers. It will also cut down on the huge workload training personnel have.
I wish you all the very best of luck!
Julianne Lee 19 Mar 2022
Hi Aveen, thank you for your comments and your feedback both as a parent having accessed the CCN service and as an educationalist. It is great to recieve your viewpoint and support from both perspectives.
The accessibility afforded by the provision of a digital training platform will certainely free up CCN time and ensure more timely access for children with complex needs into school.
The confidence it will offer to families and carers is a key project aim.
Really appreciate your input.
Regards, Julianne
charles vincent 17 Mar 2022
Great to see a project that addresses the critical task of training and supporting families at home carrying out complex clinical tasks. As more care moves into the home the 'invisible' work carried out by families will increase, for patients of all ages. Patients and families are going to be increasingly carrying out roles formerly the sole responsibility of professionals and will need to be trained and helped to do this.
Una Hughes 19 Mar 2022
Good afternoon Charles, thank you for your encouraging comments, we are passionate about the safety and integration of the children on our caseload. We currently provide annual theory and practical competency to our carers. Providing support to parents through empowerment, education and care from HCWs and CAs, that is safely delegated is imperative to their well being and the well being of the children. Reducing time spent in hospital and speeding up admission to school, helps to normalise family life for both child and parent. Our project will provide readily accessible digital information and training, but this is always backed up with face-to-face practical assessment of competency. We are keen to develop the previous work on gastrostomy videos signposted to us by members of the Q Community and have organised a meeting with Bethan Page on 21/03. We have received lots of positive support from the parents and carers we currently work with and anticipate this will be very beneficial to new parents of children with complex needs. We can see lots of scope for expansion and recognise we must get it correct in a small group before we expand further.
Thank you again
Una
Bethan Page 16 Mar 2022
Really pleased to see this project proposed- it is much needed.
A huge amount of CCN time is spent delivering training/updates to the many different types of staff/paid carers who support these children. From our experiences this really takes away from time available to work directly with families and takes up a significant proportion of CCN's time. Of course training for staff is absolutely critical- we found lots of problems with care in an analysis of incident reports for long term ventilation & enteral feeding. Blended teaching which is part digitial can really help here, especially for updates. Online resources and videos can also be used at scale. Face-to-face teaching cannot.
Please do involve families too in the development and evaluation. It's helpful for staff to see procedures done on children not just on mannequins. Videos can help enable this.
Our Q Exchange team from 2019 would be very happy to support you with this, and share our learning. I'll get in touch so we can arrange a chat. Our parent repsentatives I'm sure would have some views on this project too. I think our local CCN team in Oxford are also working on staff training online resources/videos. Happy to connect you if helpful.
Siobhan Butler 18 Mar 2022
The 2019 project created a bank of training videos which we are sharing widely with parents/carers. We were able to create these using a multi-disciplinary approach alongside parent representatives. Parents have found these useful to use as an initial introduction to gastrostomy care and gain exposure prior to surgery. They are also a useful resource for clinical support workers, nursing associates/students and staff who have limited experience of caring for those with a gastrostomy.
Una Hughes 16 Mar 2022
Hi Bethan, thank you for your comments and getting in touch I look forward to (virtually) meeting on Monday and learning from your experiences. I agree that involving parents in this project is really important as we want them to feel secure in the knowledge that the training our HCWs and CAs receive allows care to be delegated safely. We have close ties with the parents and they know their children better than anyone else. I agree that videos of real children, help in the learning process and perhaps we can also link with the Oxford CCN Team and share resources.
We really appreciate the support.
Una
Colum Conway 16 Mar 2022
This presents as an excellent project and has the capacity to make a real difference across the integrated services of health and care in Northern Ireland. When I worked at CEO of the Northern Ireland Social Care Council we collaborated on a project with the Northern Ireland Practice and Education Council for Nursing and Midwifery on promoting competence and confidence with a particular reference to safe delegation when working with children and adults with complex needs. There is a recognition within HSC Trusts that community based care requires a high level of integration and a shared knowledge, language and skills set across the workforce in health and care. Our experience was of a high level of support at all levels for this enabling approach to practice development across the work force and to have it well integrated with families, communities and schools. Good levels of relationship already exist at local and regional level to support this project. This project focuses on how the objectives can be enabled through a digital learning platform. We have found this blended approach to learning to have a very effective impact on practice, evidence shows that new skills and competencies are maintained and sustained over time. Digital literacy has been changed significantly by the pandemic and there is a much greater openness to using digital platforms for all sorts of activity including learning. Our experience in child protection and safeguarding is that many families and children and young people have reponded positively to care relationships that have a digital element to them. Digital equality remains an issue and this will need to be considered along side ensuring content in the platform remains relevant and up to date.
There will be strong support in the social care sector for this project and I know the sector will be keen to be involved in its further development.
Una Hughes 16 Mar 2022
Hi Colum, thank you for your comprehensive and thought provoking comments. I agree, there is already considerable collaboration between health and social care and we have very good relationships between health, education and social care here in Northern Ireland. We are counting on their support and collaboration and are also liaising with others outside of Northern Ireland. We will be happy to share our learning and expand the scope of our digital training and our experiences in getting this project to fruition.
I think this is a perfect time to improve our utilisation of digital technology and use it in a way to provide ‘just-in-time’ training which is flexible and breaches barriers between different sectors.
We take on board your point about digital equality and will work with all our stakeholders to seriously consider and put in place measures to counteract this issue.
Our current evidence based training is updated annually and often more frequently as legislation, procedures or equipment changes, one of our pre-requisites for the digital platform will be that we want to have the flexibility to react quickly and change the content easily.
We welcome interaction with the social care sector to explore how this could help to meet their training needs.
Many thanks for your support
Una
Paula Jordan 16 Mar 2022
I think this proposal is excellent. As a Principal in a Special School, where all of the teaching and non-teaching staff require some level of medical training, this will make life much simpler. New staff will be able to access training prior to commencing post, regardless of the time of year.
We use similar platforms for other trainings and have found that staff enjoyed accessing the training in this way, especially as the training can be carried out at times to suit us, rather than when we can arrange for Nurses.
Well done and I wish you all the best with your proposal, which will ultimately benefit our pupils.
Julianne Lee 16 Mar 2022
Hi Paula, thank you for your feedback on our project and sharing the positive experiences of your staff accessing training using a similar platform to what we are proposing. The flexibility and accessibility it will offer for both staff in schools and the CCN team will be brilliant, and as you say it will be the children who will ultimately benefit.
DAVID CUNNINGHAM 16 Mar 2022
As Principal of a Special School I was delighted to hear about this development. For us, it will mean that children can be placed in school sooner than normal giving them the best educational experience. For my staff, it will be really great to be able to access instant training and would result in a more confident delivery of care to our pupils. This would be a well welcomed initiative.
Julianne Lee 16 Mar 2022
David, thank you for your encouraging comments. Any change in the delivery of training that results in children being able to access education in a more timely manner and increases the confidence of their carers has to be welcomed.
Edel Lavery - Donard School 16 Mar 2022
This is a superb project proposal. The ability to access this training for Classroom Assistants and Teachers at a time that is suitable for the school would be such a benefit. The training platform would allow for early access to training for new staff and would provide an excellent induction tool for classroom assistants commencing work in a Special School. The proposed resource would allow our school to maintain and extend provision for those pupils with complex medical needs especially when there is a need to backfill positions. The school has used a range of interactive training programmes for staff in the past and have found them to be a positive experience.
Una Hughes 16 Mar 2022
Hi Edel, thank you for taking the time to comment on our project; it's so good to see that you are as enthusiastic about this proposal as we are. We value the partnership working we have with the schools within the Trust already and look forward to building on this as the project progresses. We feel this will have benefits for all involved, and of course we will be asking for feedback as we test and develop the resource to ensure it meets everyone's needs.
Regards
Una
Kate Pryde 16 Mar 2022
Hi Gerard
I am sure you will ahve seen ther was a Q exhange in 2019 https://q.health.org.uk/idea/2019/supporting-parents-to-care-for-children-with-medical-complexity/ on a similar theme - a few specific conditions and co-designed training videos. It would be good to reach out to Bethan and co
Bethany also works with Hilary Cass and others on Colab - a partnership to support care, edcuation and training in medical complexity in children. Def one to conenct with https://www.colabpartnership.org.uk/pages/95-hilary-cass
Locally in Wessex we have worked with parents and staff on a number of training resources and would be pelased to consdier how we can link with you and share your work https://www.piernetwork.org/nursingvideos.html
Good luck!
Una Hughes 16 Mar 2022
Hi Kate, thank you so much for your comments and helpful links, it is so beneficial to have other people's input and be signposted to other resources.
We had seen the 2019 project Supporting Parents to Care for Children with Medical Complexity have reached out to Bethan, as the videos on gastrostomy care are perfect for our training. I have registered with CoLab and Pier network and would be keen to collaborate and share learning to help move our project forward.
Thank you once again for this really useful information and links
Una
Nuala Boyle 16 Mar 2022
This is a very exciting development to the thorough, exemplary, evidence based training that is provided already. As a nurse involved in this training at a grass roots stage I feel it will enhance greatly the whole process. It will support the training process and allow delegation at its optimum level. Well done.
Una Hughes 16 Mar 2022
Hi Nuala, thank you for your comments, we are really happy to have everyone involved in this training, collaborating together. The discussions are helping us to hone our idea to make it the best it can be. Safe delegation to confident, competent HCWs and CAs enhances the lives of our children with complex needs and their families.
Many thanks for your support
Una
Sarinda Millar 15 Mar 2022
Excellent and exciting innovation! Will be of vast benefit to children, their families and healthcare services. Without a doubt this can be extrapolated out into so many areas. Offering far more flexibility and delivering training where and when it is needed. So many benefits.
Please keep me updated with your progress-I am very keen to hear how this all goes-have no doubt it will be transformational for so many. Great vision.
Are ICP staff involved-sounds like an amazing project they might be able to contribute to?
Una Hughes 15 Mar 2022
Hi Sarinda, thank you for your comments, it's great to get encouragement and to see that others are as enthusiastic about this idea as we are. We have taken on board your suggestion of involving Integrated Care Partnership staff and have reached out to them for their potential input.
We will definitely share the learning from this project and keep you updated
Many thanks
Una
Dr James Hughes Paediatrician 14 Mar 2022
This sounds like a really innovative project that has great potential to facilitate and improve staff training. These staff provide essential care for vulnerable children and young people with complex healthcare needs and the project is a novel solution to meeting their training needs.
Great idea and hope you are successful in the project.
Have you thought of developing or using an existing online portal to implement the project?
Happy to provide help and feedback.
Good luck
Julianne Lee 15 Mar 2022
Hi James, thank you for taking the time to comment on our project and your offer of support, it is really appreciated. Your suggestion of using an existing online portal prompted us to contact our newly appointed Trusts Chief Nursing & Midwifery Information Officer for input and direction. He agreed that the best approach would be to fully explore utilising an already approved and existing Learning Management System, which could be modified to meet our criteria of the need for carers working for the Trust, and outside of the Trust being able to have access to it.
We are also reaching out to our Health & Social Care Leadership Centre who have a well established and tested Learning Platform, to ascertain if it would have the functionality to host our competency based training and support the requirements of our project.
Cathy Laverty 14 Mar 2022
As a parent of a child that receives nursing care from the CCN team, I would definitely welcome this initiative. Over the last 10 years I have witnessed the training that has to be completed so the introduction of a new digital platform would have great benefits for parents & staff.
Wishing you every success.
Cathy
Julianne Lee 14 Mar 2022
Cathy, thank you so much for your support for our project. It is really important that we get feedback from a parents perspective. We believe the creation of a digital learning platform has so much potential for transforming the way we deliver our competency based training to benefit children with complex needs, their parents and carers.
Diane 14 Mar 2022
As a parent who receives regular input from the CCN team, this training will be invaluable in continuing with the high level of care and support received from parents and children with additional needs. This will enable training to be more accessible, reducing time travelling, which in turn means more time investing in these children's lives and better outcomes for children.
It will also enable staff to be trained in each child's needs in a time effective manner. This will assist with quicker hospital discharge, reducing costs, and enabling families to get the medical care within there home immediately.
Having a child with complex needs means you cannot leave your child with family or friends, and can be isolating. Ensuring easily accessed training means CCN teams can continue to provide medical intervention which supports the whole family, promotes positive mental health, and integrates them back into the community.
Julianne Lee 14 Mar 2022
Diane, thank you so much for taking the time to comment on our project. We really appreciate your input as a parent. Within our current training model, accessibility and flexibility is lacking and despite our best efforts, this can unfortunately lead to delays in hospital discharge and access to school and community groups for children with complex needs. Like you, we believe the introduction of a digital training platform will help address this and free up more time to invest with the children leading to better outcomes for both them and their families.
Anne McCaffrey 14 Mar 2022
I was very interested to read about this exciting and innovative project. It will be very beneficial to have easily accessible staff training on a digital format. This will be particularly useful for staff working night duty to be able to update their training in a timely manner when suitable and I particularly like the idea of a trigger when a competency review is required. It will also be advantageous to the wider CCN network to have the learning shared regionally. Good Luck with this project.
Una Hughes 14 Mar 2022
Thank you for your comments Anne, we look forward to sharing the learning from this project regionally and further afield. We agree that it will make access to training easier and we are passionate about safe delegation and improving confidence and competence in those caring for children with complex needs.
We appreciate your support
Una
Jacqui Lundy 13 Mar 2022
This is a fantastic project & it will certainly give staff confidence that children with complex health care needs in the community setting will receive a high standard of care . As there is an increase of skills delegated to non health care workers I feel that it is essential that they are supported & that the development of their skills is ongoing & not just annual to ensure they deliver care safely. Effective delegation increases capacity and develops and motivates employees.
Well done for all your hard work !! Good luck and I look forward to hear the outcome .
Una Hughes 14 Mar 2022
Hi Jacqui, thank you for your comments, as you say, supporting our non-registered healthcare workers and classroom assistants through robust training resources, is the key to safely delegating the care of children with complex needs. Our project to develop readily accessible digital training, is one of our strategies to ensure safe delegation and care; feedback on the idea from our staff so far, has been very positive and we look forward to its realisation and sharing the learning.
Regards
Una
Kim Brown 12 Mar 2022
As a parent who's child requires nursing care from the CCN team I would welcome this initiative. Seeing first hand the training that has to be completed the introduction of a new digital platform would reap benefits for both parent, child and healthcare professional. Namely immediate access, intervention and support as and when required. I fully support this initiative from a parents perspective.
Una Hughes 14 Mar 2022
Hi Kim, thank you for taking the time to comment on our project, we are grateful for a parent's perspective and want feedback from everyone this project will affect.
We appreciate how rewarding and wonderful the children we know are, but sometimes it can be difficult and tiring too for parents; having competent, confident carers at home and in school can help to alleviate some of the worry parents face when their children are being looked after by someone else.
We really appreciate your support and are delighted you think this is a worthwhile project.
Regards
Una
Joan Melanophy 11 Mar 2022
Hi team,
Well done on your collaboration to develop such a worthwhile project. It is uplifting to see such an engaged team working together with carers and patients to improve such a valuable service.
I really like your approach to considered planning and involvement with the children, carers and stakeholders to achieve your aim.
You have considered identifying and commissioning a digital partner in your plan. It may be worth considering exploring if there are opportunities through Encompass to support this aspect of the plan.
I like that you have engaged both hearts and minds. The photo of this beautiful child instantly reminds and connects us to the lives impacted by this great work. It may be even better if there were data to support the challenges that you refer to providing even more credibility to the difficulties outlined.
This is a very strong project with lots of ambition. It may be worth considering articulating what you want to improve, by how much and by when, then focusing improvement on a smaller aspect of the project initially. It could be worth carrying out PDSA cycles and learning from this before you scale and spread this worthwhile project further afield.
This is a very inspirational project for the future of these children, their carers and the great teams that work with them. Best of luck to you all.
Joan Melanophy
Una Hughes 15 Mar 2022
Hi Joan, thank you for your comments and enthusiasm for our project, we have already gained insight and contacts from the input of The Q Community to enhance our work, it is a great resource to support Quality Improvement.
Your ideas about Encompass are interesting and we have now requested meetings with the appropriate people to investigate the potential links this could have with our project.
We have previously gathered feedback about training and our experiences led us to develop this proposal and we agree that data will help support this project. We have been using and intend to continue using PDSA cycles in our evaluations as the project progresses and appreciate your suggestion of quantifying our improvements. We are working closely with our QI Team within the Trust, who are supporting us in identifying issues and implementing solutions, with feedback from stakeholders, to provide sustainable quality improvement.
We look forward to sharing the learning.
Many thanks for your input and support, it is really appreciated
Una
Maria Quigley 11 Mar 2022
This sound great. This would be very beneficial to all staff, being able to access Theory work at any time. to double check on some material that is carried out in HCW up dates, not just yearly but 24/7. This will be amazing
Una Hughes 14 Mar 2022
Hi Maria, thank you for your kind comments, we are delighted that you like the idea of being able to access theory and information at any time to benefit healthcare workers and classroom assistants to increase confidence and ultimately benefit the children and their families.
Regards
Una
Lindsey Oliver 11 Mar 2022
What a fabulous idea! I’ve been a HCW for 17years for the community children’s team for children with complex needs. This would be so beneficial for the HCW’s as we could just refresh our training using this! It would also be great for any new team members to be able to revisit the theory anytime to increase there confidence! It would also be great to be able to do your training at a time that suits with both work and home commitments would support a good work life balance!
Julianne 11 Mar 2022
It is great to recieve such positive feedback on our project from such an experienced health care worker, who undertakes competency based training year on year. Knowing you can access theory and trouble shooting materials 24/7 should increase the confidence of carers especially those new to the role. The added bonus of supporting a good work life balance through the flexibility a digital training platform offers is positive for both carers and managers.
Julianne Lee 11 Mar 2022
Thank you Suzie for such positive feedback. Having instant access to training materials 24/7 should reassure carers who are providing care to children with complex needs and increase both their confidence, and the confidence of parents, and the nurses delegating care.
David Graham 11 Mar 2022
This is an excellent project and I can see how it will make a big difference to the quality of care that children with complex needs and their families will receive.
It appears that this will be really useful way of keep vital skills up to date and to disseminate new learning.
Please let me know if I can help to develop this - would be glad to become involved.
Thanks
Una Hughes 11 Mar 2022
Hi David, thank you for your kind comments, we look forward to improving access to the training we currently provide, through use of a digital platform. We anticipate the benefits of this initiative and are keen to get as varied a perspective as possible, so really appreciate your offer of help, we will be in touch for help and feedback as we journey through this process.
Regards
Una
Fergal White 11 Mar 2022
Community Childrens Nursing Tam continue to work tirelessly to achieve the very best outcomes for this very special group of children and young people. This exciting project perfectly harnesses their innovation, drive and enthusiasm to support those whom they work with both service users and carers through effective and timely training provision .
Una Hughes 11 Mar 2022
Hi Fergal, we feel privileged to work with these children and young people and their amazing families and are really excited about this project and the benefits it will provide. Thank you so much for your lovely comments.
Regards
Una
Suzie Matthews 11 Mar 2022
This looks like a very innovative approach to the provision of training . Not only will it benefit our service users and their families but by having instant access I would hope it would help build the confidence of the HCW ,classroom assistants and other carers who can access training at a time that suits them and also revisit the training at any time should they feel the need . I wish you all the best with your project.
Una Hughes 11 Mar 2022
Hi Suzie, thank you for comments, we're really keen to look at new ways to provide training and assess competency for the care we delegate. We agree with you that it will be a useful resource for classroom assistants and healthcare workers to access as required and to refresh their knowledge. We will be interested to get your feedback when we pilot the digital platform.
Regards
Una
Marie McKernan 11 Mar 2022
I wish you every success with this project. The CCN Team will support you in any way we can. I can envisage that this will be very beneficial to our training process and it will allow more time for us to provide nursing care to these very special children on our caseload.
Julianne Lee 11 Mar 2022
Hi Marie,
Thank you for your support. We totally agree that having our training and competency records on a digital platform will definitely release more time for both our nurses and health care workers to care for the children on our caseload and support their families.
Ruth Harte 10 Mar 2022
What an exciting project which could really make a difference to the standard and quality of care provided to children and young people with complex healthcare needs by providing and supporting expertise knowledge and skills to carers delivering their care needs. This will not only expedite staffs training but also increases confidence and skill by providing up to date knowledge in a timely manner which is more accessible for staff and also managers. I think this is a game changer for competency-based training for carers which could be used not only across many areas in the community but also within acute settings too. Best of luck with the project and I look forward to hearing how it progresses.
Julianne Lee 11 Mar 2022
Hi Ruth,
Thank you for taking the time to comment. The potential to expedite staff training is significant and will ultimately lead to children with complex needs being discharged from hospital earlier and able to access school and community groups in a timelier manner.
From a managers perspective the ability to have real time data on staff training and competencies, with inbuilt triggers to notify when refresher training and competency reviews are required will be invaluable.
As you say this is a ‘game changer’ for competency-based training. The model could be easily transferred to the acute setting where competency training is often commenced when the child is an inpatient.
We will keep you updated as our project progresses.
Beth Banfield 10 Mar 2022
Great to see clear aims and how you'll share learning on this project.
You might have already seen a previous winning project in Q Exchange Supporting parents to care for children with medical complexity - they developed a library of videos which they have shared, they may also be able to share helpful insight on how to best engage with parents and carers.
Julianne Lee 10 Mar 2022
Hi Beth, We hadn’t already seen this project so thank you so much for sharing the link. It is a brilliant resource and fits perfectly with what we are trying to achieve in standardising training, ensuring accessibility and promoting competence and confidence in carers of children with complex needs. The strength of the co-production within the project is front and centre and we would welcome the opportunity to learn from their experiences of engaging with carers. We will definitely connect with the project team.
Anne Ross 10 Mar 2022
This is a really worthwhile and exciting project. You have clearly identified the potential benefits that embracing the technology available and developing a digital training platform could achieve. Anything that expedites the smooth and timely discharge of children with complex needs from hospital, improves their journey into and through the education system, and increases their ability to access community groups/life experiences is to be welcomed. This is a very positive step forward, building on the already extensive work you have achieved in regard to training and competency for heath care workers/education staff/parents/carers etc. I can see that there will be much scope for shared learning with this project and look forward to following your progress. Wishing you success.
Julianne Lee 10 Mar 2022
Hi Anne,
Thank you for taking the time to comment on our project and supporting the positive benefits that the development of a digital training platform will offer our carers, children and families. We believe the scope for sharing the learning gained will be valuable to other community children’s nursing teams both regionally and nationally.
Gary Jenkins 9 Mar 2022
Caring for Children with complex needs can be challenging. This project would help to address the issues that often prevent timely discharge from hospital and admission to school and community groups. Having 24/7 access to training by has been shown to increase compliance and having an up to date readily available database of appropriately skilled staff will allow timely allocation of staff and provision of services. Definitely a project that could be of benefit to many other services providers regionally.
Una Hughes 10 Mar 2022
Thank you Gary for your very positive comments, we are very excited and committed to this project and can see great potential for it once we get it up and running. We plan to set it up for children with complex needs within SHSCT first, evaluate it and iron out any problems before we disseminate it regionally. We can see the potential benefits for other areas where care is delegated to unregistered healthcare workers and volunteers.
Regards Una
Mark Irwin 9 Mar 2022
This is a much needed service for a group of highly marginalised children within society and the work this team carries out is highly specialised and essential. We need more joined up working between the different services and a truly integrated health and social care system that is responsive to the needs of families. This fits in with the current working climate and some of the issues HSC are experiencing.
The key thing here will be an effective communication strategy with relevant stakeholders and an approach that encourages and supports buy in from a wide variety of different agencies and community groups. Perhaps it would be a good idea to utilise the Trust's desktop advertising feature to inform Trust employees of this venture? Contracts Department could be contacted to disseminate with community groups fulfilling contractual obligations for the Trust.
Great venture everyone and look forward to seeing the results.
Julianne Lee 10 Mar 2022
Mark, many thanks for your feedback on our project and giving us some really good suggestions. An effective communication strategy will be key and really like the idea of utilising the Trusts Desktop to spread the word about our project to as many Trust employees as possible. Once we have tested and evaluated our training & competency platform with our Trust staff and classroom assistants in schools we would aim to share more widely with community partners.
Regards
Julianne
Lucy Lavery 9 Mar 2022
As a Community Children's Nurse I can truly see the benefits of this innovative project for all involved. There will be a huge interest for everyone that this new project will have a positive impact on. Parents will be so appreciative of anything that would speed up the discharge process so they can have their child at home with their families. The 24/7 access to this alone will enable the CCN Team to develop its already robust competency framework to benefit staff, the service the CCN Team provides and most importantly the families and their children with complex needs. Well done on this very creative, practical and truly beneficial project
Una Hughes 9 Mar 2022
Thank you Lucy for taking the time to comment on our project. We will be working closely with our CCN colleagues locally and hopefully regionally to develop this for the benefit of all. Feedback from the parents is one of the driving forces behind this project, to speed up hospital discharge and admission to schools/community groups and we feel we will meet these expectations. Please feel free to share any further suggestions with us.
Regards
Una
Eilidh McGregor 8 Mar 2022
This is a really great project, an excellent way to improve the quality of care for children and their families. We know it is essential for families to be supported in the community; it is an area that requires rapid growth in order to deliver the high quality of care to these families. I think the project is well set out and once you have trialed the process and got it to the stage you would like, a robust implementation plan will make sure it is used to its full potential. Well done.
Julianne Lee 9 Mar 2022
Thank you Eildih for your positive feedback on our project. It is very much appreciated and we believe the project has great potential to benefit not only children with complex needs and their families but the nurses and carers who support them in the community.
We are very focused on developing a robust implementation plan and are already considering how we will do this.
Shirley Dennison 8 Mar 2022
What a very innovative project with clear aims. It is really difficult for families when a child / young person requires additional help and support in the family and knowing that the model is about integration with appropriate needs led training can only enhance the safe delivery of care that the children / young people need. Wishing you every success.
Julianne Lee 8 Mar 2022
Thank you Shirley for your comments, we are feeling very positive about our project and how it will enhance the safe delivery of delegated care for children with complex needs at home, in school and the wider community.
Peter Johnston 8 Mar 2022
This is a great step forward for the CCN service. The benefits of centrally recorded, accessible and transferrable training are easily seen for Health and Education providers. Not only this but families will have a greater confidence in the delivery of care regardless of the setting.
I wish you all the success with this exciting project
Julianne Lee 8 Mar 2022
Thank you Peter for your comments and support. Totally agree that the benefits are very clear. Children and families will have greater confidence in the continuity, consistency, and impartiality of testing of carers knowledge which a digital training/competency platform will deliver.
David Grier 8 Mar 2022
This is an excellent way of improving the quality of life of children with complex needs and their families and improving the safety of their management at home, school and elsewhere. Please let me know if I can help in any way. David
Una Hughes 8 Mar 2022
Thank you David, we are determined to make quality improvements to our service to benefit the children with complex needs and their families and we feel this project does just that. We really appreciate your interest and offer of support; your knowledge and experience as a Q community member and consultant paediatrician will be invaluable and we will be in touch as the project progresses.
Regards
Una
Thomas Weijburg 7 Mar 2022
This is a really exciting proposition. In order to move to the next stage in this process you may want to consider how the digital technology will be utilised and implemented, and how this may help to, for example, overcome any service access issues
Una Hughes 7 Mar 2022
Thank you Thomas, we are really excited and enthusiastic about the potential of this project.
Our digital platform will mirror our current competency based training, which is already well established.
We know who will be using it, when it will be used and the functionality required for it to be an efficient and effective medium for training and competency assessment.
Our main users will be from the unregistered Healthcare workers from Community Children’s Nursing Team and classroom assistants from special and mainstream schools. We will be using our existing strong links between the Education Authority, local schools and nurseries to co-produce this digital training platform.
Accessibility will expedite hospital discharge and ensure children with complex needs are able to access school and community groups in a timely manner. The fact that the platform will be available 24/7 will support this and allow staff flexibility in undertaking their training. This will help overcome the difficulties we have experienced in releasing carers to attend training and annual updates.
We would really appreciate the opportunity to learn from other’s experiences in the development of digital learning tools and how they overcame any issues, they encountered.
Many Thanks
Una
Joan McMahon 7 Mar 2022
An inspirational project that is embracing technology innovation which will result in parents/carer, education staff and health care workers being able to access training required to build competency and build confidence for the safe care of children with nursing needs. Definitely a winner for all involved.
Una Hughes 7 Mar 2022
Thank you Joan for your kind words, we are really excited about this project because we know the benefits it will provide to the children and families we are involved with. We can also see huge scope for its implementation in other areas.
Many thanks
Una
Jacqueline Morton 7 Mar 2022
Its heartwarming to read your project aim, to bring services closer to home and be responsive to the needs of carers, our partners in care provision. I can see the real quality and safety benefits to this project which aims to build carers confidence and competence. I was wondering if UU or QUB university's would be willing to get involved? Your project could be a blueprint for supporting carers in the community.
Julianne 7 Mar 2022
Thank you Jacqueline for recognising the real benefits of our project, which is for unregistered carers. We really appreciate feedback and questions from the Q community.
We agree this project could be a blueprint for competency-based training for carers, who are providing care that has been delegated to them, in not only the community but also acute settings.
Our Healthcare workers complete a level 3 Regulations Quality Framework Diploma (RQF) and we plan to add the evidence from our digital platform to their RQF e-portfolio, helping them progress through their diploma with competence and confidence. This is not delivered through our universities but locally within our Trust.
In what way do you think our universities could become involved in supporting our project?
Look forward to hearing from you and thanks again for your comments.
Julianne
Emily Roberts 4 Mar 2022
This is an exciting and transformational project that will no doubt improve outcomes for children and families. I believe the learning gained will be easily transferred to other service areas. I look forward to hearing more about it. Good luck to the team .
Julianne 7 Mar 2022
Thank you Emily for your positive feedback, It is much appreciated. I totally agree that outcomes for children and families will be improved and the learning gained will be easily transferred to other service areas. Will keep you updated as our project progresses.
Regards
Julianne
Ronan McBride 4 Mar 2022
Looks great Gerard.
Best of luck for the team!
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