Caring Together Events!

20^th-24^th July 2015

  

At the start of the week I attended the Caring Together Stakeholder Panel event at Poynton Civic Centre. Stakeholders from the local community were invited to attend and presentations were given from several projects that are being ran in the local community-being piloted/in the first year of set up. These presentations were very informative as members of the projects gave their presentations and brought along patients that they helped through the programmes they are running. It was really lovely to see that these projects are making a difference to people’s lives. By attending these events it helps me to keep up-to-date with the great work that is being conducted in the community of Eastern Cheshire.

I was also given my first solo project this week. For every event held by the CCG, we collect feedback from the participants on how well they think the event was organised. In our weekly transformation team meeting we identified that to keep high standards for the Caring Together events it would be useful to have an events pack that contains all of the information that is required for an event; an event plan, facilitators pack and also a report template. This project relies greatly on me so I hope I can do it justice!

Getting used to full-time working life!

13th-17th July 2015

After completing my first week at the Eastern Cheshire Clinical Commissioning Group (ECCCG), my second week has come around so quickly! I feel much more settled in this week and part of the team. I am also starting to get more familiar with the complexity of the way the CCG works and the vast amount of terminology and acronyms! As part of the Community Based Co-ordinated Care (CBCC) workshop I attended last week, I was asked after the event to collate all of the feedback from the individual workshop stations into documents that captured the participant’s views. This was a very interesting task as it showed me different sides to an event; both attending the event as a staff member at the CCG and also reviewing feedback after the event on the topics covered and also how well the event was ran.

Also this week I had my first 1:1 meeting with my line manager Jane Stairmand. This meeting is going to be held so that it allows us to go through any areas of concerns we have. In this week’s meeting we discussed the areas of work I am likely to be involved in during my time at the CCG and also Jane outlined mandatory training activities and other training opportunities that I can take advantage of during the year that will enhance my skill set. These meetings will be held weekly for my first few months at the CCG whilst I settle in.

Another activity I was involved with this week was the monthly staff briefing where all the staff from the CCG are invited to attend. This month there was a presentation from Anna Whitehead who is the Cheshire East JSNA lead to inform us about the development of Cheshire East’s Joint Strategic Needs Assessment(JSNA). The aim of this programme is to improve the strategic planning, commissioning of both the Local Authority and the NHS to improve health and wellbeing and help tackle inequalities to deliver the best service for the Eastern Cheshire population. Also in each staff briefing Jerry Hawker, who is the Chief Officer at the CCG, up-dates all of the staff on the important events and projects happening at the CCG. I found this very helpful; as I am a new member of staff it was very informative and provided me with a great insight as to the current projects the CCG is involved with.

As well as these tasks I have completed my mandatory training for new NHS members of staff and also read through documents to help with my understanding of the structure of the ECCCG.

First week at the CCG!

6th-10th July 2015

My name is Amy Towey and I am a student at Sheffield Hallam University studying a Business Studies degree. As part of my degree I have been given the opportunity to take a year out from my studies at university and undertake a work placement where I will be able gain practical experience that I can then relate to my studies. I was extremely lucky to be able to secure a placement at the NHS Eastern Cheshire Clinical Commissioning Group (ECCCG) where my role is Transformation Programme Support Officer.

During my first week at the CCG I was involved in many activities, meeting all of the team at the CCG and understanding their roles, reading the starter pack which contained many useful NHS documents and also I was involved in two events that the Transformation Team were running. In addition I attended several meetings at the CCG during the week and this helped me to gain an insight into how it is run on a day to day basis; which is very complex!

On Wednesday I attended my first event with the CCG as part of the Transformation Team. It was an event held at Macclesfield Town Hall where the GP’s and Practice Managers from all 23 practices in Eastern Cheshire were invited to attend. The main aim of the event was to outline to them as part of the Caring Together Programme the draft copy of the service specification for general practice for the coming years. During the event there were workshop based activities where the GP’s and Practice Managers were asked to comment on different areas of the contract. After the event I had the responsibility of collating all of the feedback together which could then be used to assist the creation of the final specification. It was very interesting to see which areas they both agreed and disagreed with.

I was also lucky enough to attend another event with the CCG. This one was the Community Based Co-ordinated Care Workshop with stakeholders from the local community of East Cheshire invited including; CCG staff, members of the East Cheshire Council (ECC), patient representatives and care staff that work in the local community. As part of the event the attendees were split into several groups to discuss areas of difficulty around integrating care within the community; Information Sharing, Cultural Transformation and Workforce, Clinical Responsibility and Empowered Person. I was taking part in the group discussions and it was very interesting to see the different points of view amongst the group. This workshop was very informative for me to help understand the different areas within community based care.

I have really enjoyed my first week at the CCG and learning how it plays a very important role within the community, ensuring that the services they commission now and in the future meet the needs of the Eastern Cheshire population. I look forward to the next twelve months ahead at the CCG and developing my knowledge and skills in this area of the NHS.