Networks pick up current issues and pressures with a chance to get peer support or link with commissioners and other public sector colleagues.

DHSC announced that Oxfordshire has joined the other five local authorities as a trailblazer early implementer of charging reforms ahead of the national date of October 2023.

The trailblazers will shape the Government approach to the implementation of the charging reform across England, by allowing DHSC to trial key aspects of the reforms.

The deadline has been extended to Sunday 7 August.

Oxfordshire County Council has confirmed that, "any data you provide will only be used for this exercise, to establish a fair cost of care in Oxfordshire. Records will be kept safe and will be destroyed upon completion of the process”.

We have created a Fair Cost of Care webpage with all the links and advice you need to enable to you submit your data.

It's really important that we find a way to enable all providers to have their voices heard in this process.

If you are a home care provider and wish to submit anonymously, you can do this via eddy.mcdowall1@nhs.net. We will ensure your data is submitted before the final deadline.

We regularly get asked if we are re-starting face to face training as we are now 'Living with Covid'. Therefore we are sharing and promoting the following opportunity organised by St Luke's Hospital to test whether a return to face to face training would be useful.

SPIN Study Day | Manual Handling Train the Trainer 1 day refresher 

This course is to enable Manual Handling Trainers to update their skills in a cost effective way in a convenient location by Edexcel accredited Manual Handling Trainers. This course is not just for qualified nurses. It will be held on

Please book your places through Richard Burden using this form.

Oxfordshire County Council has set out a timetable for moving existing ETMS users across to ContrOCC by 31 March 2023. The letter above is for home care providers providing 'legacy packages'. We are aiming to invite the Council to set out more details in our first September home care network.

A new JSNA bitesize is now available on the cost of food, part of a planned series related to the cost of living. Download the bitesize report here

Oxfordshire’s new Food Strategy (May 2022) sets out challenges and actions, including tackling food poverty.

Citizens Advice North Oxfordshire and South Northants have helped with this bitesize.

DHSC SE has asked Charles Taylor at Oxfordshire Care home Association to do some quick research on the barriers to care workers working longer hours, and in particular the fact that we have large numbers of part-time workers. The stories that we usually have are:

We are working with the Department of Health to carry out some research on care staff working hours and whether there are any changes that Government could make to allow individuals to carry out more full-time work to alleviate some of the pressures on the social care workforce. The hope is that we can then work with the department to lobby for changes so that some of these barriers can be removed. Below are a series of questions based on your experience in your role - we would really appreciate any answers that you can give.

For ease of collection we have created a quick 2-minute survey that can collate the results, please click on the link here https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/VMBMX3Y

More on the SE Business Portal. Expression of interest open to 4 October 2022.

Integrated Commissioning Systems came into being on 1 July. They replaced Clinical Commissioning Groups and will be responsible for commissioning NHS services in the local region. Since much of adult social care is funded or part-funded through pooled budgets, it is important that adult social care is not only connected but also embedded in decision making.

This Good Governance Guide provides a straightforward primer of the development steps and best practice for where partners should feature in the system.

Looking at our Non-Exec Directors on the BOB ICS in the Leadership Team, none appear to have experience in adult social care, so there is an opportunity here for our sector to support and inform them of the challenges you are facing and what needs to improve to hold the Leadership Team to account.

The ICB Place Team has been announced.

And also the ICB Executive Board has been updated.

BOB Integrated Commissioning Board would like to extend an invitation to you to attend the 14th Annual UK & International ANTT®Conference in London on 21 October, fully funded by BOB ICB.

The registration and travel cost will be fully funded by the BOB ICB (IPC team)

If you are interested in attending the face-to-face or online live stream conference, please contact Hilary Munube, IPC Lead before the end of July. 

We would like your views as a care home manager on your experiences of caring for deteriorating residents, tools used to identify and care for residents at risk of deterioration such as RESTORE2 and the broader context of maintaining health and wellbeing of your residents. We would like you to complete a short questionnaire that will take 10 minutes. This is an opportunity for you to have a voice and share views and experiences to influence policy and planning in this area.

The University of Oxford and the Oxford Academic Health Science Network (AHSN) are collaborating with the Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire West Integrated Care System (ICS) to better understand and hopefully contribute to improving quality of life and care in care homes. The project is led by Professor Ray Fitzpatrick, as part of a NIHR long term programme (https://www.arc-oxtv.nihr.ac.uk/). A particular focus is on implementing RESTORE2 - an assessment tool for residents, but we are also very keen to understand the broader context of pressures and opportunities facing those who manage care homes.

If you are interested and would like to complete the survey, please use this link https://tinyurl.com/Oxford-RESTORE2-Survey to access the survey. There is no obligation to take part. The survey deadline has been extended to the end of August 2022.

We look forward to receiving your response. Thank you very much for your time.

Step back Cameron, Grand Slam semi-finalist and stand aside, Geraint, third podium finish in four years.

Sverige we will always love you, but as you said so yourself, The Winner Takes it All.

Following last week's article on the gloomy predictions by ADASS on the state of care, Skills for Care has published their report, the size and structure of the adult social care workforce.

For the first time since figures were recorded the adult social care workforce has shrunk. Bearing in mind that demand is increasing, that's shocking, but predictable. The figures back up at a national level what you were experiencing individually. Last year was the hardest ever for recruitment and this year is even worse.

Skills for Care CEO, Oonagh Smyth, says:

You can see detailed monthly tracking information here.

To help with recruitment, the Care Association Alliance south east has written a step-by-step guide to overseas recruitment. Read more here

The guide was produced with Local Government Association and ADASS.

The Care Workers' Charity is hosting the fifth Professional Care Workers' Week (starting 12 September 2022. The week is an opportunity to discuss key challenges of the pandemic and take stock of the incredible work of our workforce.

Across the four days, a series of webinars and panel discussions will be held, free of charge and open to all. If you would like to celebrate your workforce during this week please use #PCWW22 on social media.

The Digital Social Care website was established in 2019 with funding from the NHS to provide support and engagement for the adult social care sector around the development and use of technology.

If you would like more information or can take part in an interview please get in touch with katie@digitalsocialcare.co.uk.

A reminder that DHSC has published the Formal Notice setting out what information is required by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care from CQC-regulated adult social care providers, under section 277A of the Health and Social Care Act 2012, as inserted by section 99 of the Health and Care Act 2022. 

From 31 July 2022, the DHSC are mandating a core subset of the data that providers have been submitting regularly through the Capacity Tracker.

For care home provider locations, the mandatory information will be:

In addition, there will be further changes to made to COVID-19 vaccination data collection, these

changes will come in from September 2022. From September 2022, the DHSC will also be changing the 

COVID-19 vaccination questions asked of providers. These changes are set out below.

DHSC sets out how it is defining ‘full primary courses’ in Annex A, available here.

For care home providers the COVID-19 vaccination questions will be replaced with:

For domiciliary care providers the COVID-19 vaccination questions will be replaced with:

Specific guidance on enforcement will be published once the enforcement regulations are made and will be linked to in the guidance once published. Although the department will be mandating data from 31 July 2022, they will they will not be rolling out the enforcement mechanism before November 2022.

Financial penalties will normally be a last step as DHSC anticipate using them where both the following apply:

The enforcement process will happen over a period of months. Providers will be given a chance to make their case and outline why they have not supplied data and why a financial penalty should not be imposed.

Even after a final penalty notice is issued, the DHSC expect that providers may be able to avoid a fine by providing the data required.

The level of the fines will be the same as a provider’s CQC registration fee.

Yes, a provider who has been issued with a final penalty notice will be able to appeal to the First-tier Tribunal.

There will be times when some of the required information cannot be updated by a provider because the provider is unable to get that information despite, or the information is not relevant to their setting.

If this the case:

The CT is managed by the North of England Care System Support (NECS) unit who provide a dedicated support centre – Monday to Friday, 8am to 5pm – to support care providers and wider stakeholder users of the CT.

Providers will be contacted when they have not updated their CT data and will be offered support or advice on completing the return. This will be done via NECS as at present, or via other routes depending on the issue. Refer to the guidance for a more in-depth overview of the guidance and support available to providers.

Some of the key points in relation to data use and privacy are laid out below, however providers should refer to the guidance for a more detailed overview:

More than a million businesses now eligible for Help to Grow as software scheme receives a boost

Help to Grow: Digital Scheme eligibility expanded to businesses with at least one employee, meaning up to 1.2 businesses could benefit.

Health Education England e-learning for healthcare has worked with a wide range of experts to develop a new Autism Awareness e-learning programme.

The programme aims to train people about autism and provide information about the challenges that autistic people can experience. It has been authored by autistic people and includes real life video diaries. The programme aims to provide insight and guidance on what health and care workers can do to make their services more accessible to autistic people by describing how straightforward reasonable adjustments can be made to services and ways of working.

BA.5 now dominant in the UK according to UKHSA variant technical briefing

The latest UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) COVID-19 variant technical briefing, published today, includes updated epidemiological analysis which indicates that Omicron BA.5 has, as expected, become the dominant SARS-CoV-2 variant in the UK.

Acute hospitals are reporting that although the numbers are small, numbers of people in ICU due to covid-19 are increasing.

Government has released a statement on the UK Covid-19 Inquiry which will be chaired by Baroness Heather Hallett. The statement sets out the terms for scope and participation. It's likely that some care providers may be called for evidence specifically or that a general call for evidence may go out at a later date. The opening statement makes no specific mention of social care.

Baroness Hallett writes:

The Royal Academy of Engineering and the National Engineering Policy Centre were asked to look more deeply at the issue of how poor ventilation contributes to poor indoor air quality. The report, Time for a major upgrade, highlights 8 actions to improve the health and sustainability of our indoor environments through regulations and standards that apply throughout the life of new or existing buildings. It also recommends setting a clear baseline for what best practice in infection resilience looks like and encouraging a commissioning process that ensures all buildings operate as they were designed to.

On the 13 June 2022 Care Shop went live on a warehouse management system. The new warehouse system had a bug which has caused some order and delivery issues. The issues have been fixed and Care Shop are now in recovery. If you are waiting for orders which you have placed and they have not turned up, please email Care Shop Customer Service on orders@careshop.co.uk who will make sure that your orders are fulfilled in a timely manner.

CareShop is one of many suppliers available at competitive prices through Spectrum Consortium available to all care providers operating in the Thames Valley.

Women and girls across England will benefit from improved healthcare following the publication of the first ever government-led Women’s Health Strategy for England.

Following a call for evidence which generated almost 100,000 responses from individuals across England, and building on Our Vision for Women’s Health, the strategy sets bold ambitions to tackle deep-rooted, systemic issues within the health and care system to improve the health and wellbeing of women, and reset how the health and care system listens to women. 

Calling Third Sector Social Care Providers | HEE-funded Peer Support offer for 3rd sector

This offer is available again this year. DHSC is seeking expressions of interest for this to be sent to the Wessex School of Public Health at HEE – WessexPublicHealthSchool.SE@hee.nhs.uk by Monday 5 September 2022.

The training will be delivered by With-you (see this flyer) who have been commissioned to deliver the PSW and Peer Supervisor Training. DHSC has asked the With-you Training Lead to attend a forthcoming Third Sector network meeting where they will be able to answer any questions you may have regarding the training [I'm sorry we don't have details of these DHSC networks but presume that Third Sector organisations are directly in contact].

For those who are interested in taking up this offer please answer the questions below to express your interest and return to WessexPublicHealthSchool.SE@hee.nhs.uk:

Three schemes paid for through WRRF to support the existing workforce and future recruitment.

Find out more below:

Care Friends candidates are 9x more likely to be hired than job board candidates and 50% less likely to leave in the first 6 months.

Alex Ruck-Keen has recorded a video providing an overview of how the LPS is relevant for care providers (primarily residential care providers), and what steps they need to be taking to ready themselves for LPS implementation.

The slides to which Alex refers to are here.

A series of training opportunities for care home staff from Immedicare over June, July and August including:

Running through July is a series of workshops promoting tips and hacks developed by Community Integrated Care to help the care sector through the energy crisis.

The Taking Charge campaign is a special campaign to help people who work in social care, and the people they support, find ways to reduce their energy bills.

Workshops will take place live via Zoom and will last approximately 40 minutes.

3 short training sessions covering Dysphagia and IDDSI (International Dysphagia Diet Standardisation Initiative) that will cover:

Please email Sue.Langan@nhs.net for details.

And an excellent opportunity to re-share this fabulous mini-series on the IDDSI Framework from February 2021 led by OakHouse Kitchen and supported by outstanding Care Home, The Close.

Watch the box set all over again.

Please book the date for the third Workforce Roundtable.

The purpose of the Workforce Round Table meetings is to provide a forum for social care providers to come together for focused conversations about workforce issues and support available in Oxfordshire. We will circulate an agenda closer to the time.

We are looking for enthusiastic people, with a passion for the environment, reducing health inequalities and generally making things fairer and greener. If this is you, please contact Hannah Cole: hannah.cole-hall@nhs.net and we will invite you to the first session and you can play your part in making a difference!

WellbeingLine@berkshire.nhs.uk

Oxfordshire Safeguarding Adults Board consultation line for professionals

The Data Security and Protection Toolkit (DSPT)

COVID-19 infection rates dashboard usually updated weekly:

The Oxfordshire Trusted Assessor service is closed and awaiting a decision by commissioners for recommissioning.

A service provision for Berkshire East is under discussion.

For Milton Keynes and Buckinghamshire, the Trusted Assessor Service is run for care homes only by Lincolnshire Care Association.

Contact: Michelle Yusuf -

Please raise these through the relevant Patient Advice and Liaison Service (PALS). All matters that go through PALS get raised at clinical governance in their particular area of expertise e.g. orthopaedics / LD etc, so it is imperative that any matters that need raising go through this route.

As well as a constant stream of questions and answers by email from around the country, we are also part of the CAA fortnightly teleconference on Wednesdays. This informs us of current concerns and potential solutions and helps inform our local communications.

We are mailing out once a week on a Wednesday, so you know when to look out for it. These updates will provide summary advice on emerging issues and signpost providers to government and other statutory agency advice as needed.

We are always keen to hear from providers, if you have anything you would like to share with provider colleagues, please send to the usual address.

Brilliant training! It was easily the best and most relevant training that I have ever had since I started work. It has had a massively positive effect on myself and the team - without it we would have suffered badly during the pandemic! | Amy Price - Cancer Nurse Specialist

Log My Care is accredited by NHSX as an ‘Assured Supplier’ for Digital Social Care Records.

With annually rising charges and continual changes in government legislation, we believe there’s a better, brighter way of managing your utilities over and above the habit of annual renewal.

We can help cut through the confusion; free you from the stresses of managing bills, chasing payments and validating invoices.

We can help you establish low-carbon, energy-efficient plans, delivering profound cost savings and helping to safeguard the environment for future generations.

Or contact us with colleague details who would like to be on the mailing list.

Remember to update us if you're moving on.