Guidance-heavy mailing this week - there's a lot going on isn't there?

Since we wrote last week, this piece of guidance appears to have been corrected. It should now be in line with the wider announcements about the suspension of confirmatory PCRs and the removal of LFDs from the 90-day retesting rule.

This guidance has also been updated to align it with the announcement about the removal of confirmatory PCR tests. The guidance in the Outbreaks section has been updated to reflect UKHSA's current position. Other than that, previous restrictions remain in place.

The management of staff and exposed patients or residents in health and social care settings guidance was updated to bring it into line with the wider announcement about self-isolation being reduced to five days.

Social care staff who test positive can now end their isolation on the sixth day, provided they have 2 consecutive negative LFD tests on days five and six, and continue taking LFDs for the remainder of the 10 days. The guidance in section 2.2 is then the same as previously. If the staff member’s LFD test result is positive on the 10th day, they should continue to take daily LFD tests, and can return to work after a single negative LFD test result. If the staff member’s LFD test result is still positive on the 14th day, they can stop testing and return to work on day 15.

The guidance for staff who are contacts of a case has not changed.

Please also note that while the isolation requirement for hospital patients who have been a contact has been reduced to 10 days, it remains 14 days for residents of care homes. We are very aware of the disparity of this when compared to the guidance for the wider population and have raised it. The following pieces of guidance have been updated to reflect this change:

Care Home Outbreaks policy continues to be the following:

"UKHSA have advised their Health Protection Team that with immediate effect, outbreaks of Omicron variant SARS-CoV-2 in care homes can now be managed as per standard outbreak protocols. Public health actions and the duration of outbreak restrictions will revert to those used under the standard variant approach. Specific changes include Recovery testing in Omicron-driven outbreaks will revert back to the standard 14 day period. Outbreak control restrictions may be lifted if now new cases detected at this point. UKHSA continue to advise on the importance of rigorous implementation of all IPC measures and reiterate the importance of COVID-19 booster vaccination for eligible staff and patients as a key protection."

DHSC has announced that free PPE will be extended to March 2023 following overwhelming support for the move. However, this comes with a caveat:

'The government has decided to extend free PPE to health and care sectors by up to one year to March 2023 or until the infection prevention and control guidance on PPE usage for COVID-19 is either withdrawn or significantly amended (whichever is sooner).'

DHSC is in the process of updating several pieces of guidance in line with the latest clinical advice. Guidance will be published fully in the coming days.

We understand that any changes to the guidance can have a significant effect on the way you work and interact with care recipients. To give you foresight of the key changes in our guidance, and to prepare for their implementation, we have set out the material changes below:

If you're feeling bemused by changes to management of staff and exposed patients and residents in health and social care settings, don't worry, you aren't alone. This guidance has changed seven times from 15 December. The latest change on Monday reflects the change in the isolation period in hospitals from 14 to 10 days for cases and contacts of cases of COVID-19 and includes new changes to self-isolation periods for staff in health and care settings.

This has been produced to aid local decision making about service and staff prioritisation until 1 March 2022.

The decision about where community health workforce are re-deployed is a local one but is most likely to focus on the priority areas of supporting as many patients as possible to be discharged, admission avoidance work and supporting the COVID vaccination programme.

Read the framework here: https://www.england.nhs.uk/coronavirus/wp-content/uploads/sites/52/2022/01/Community-Health-Services-Prioritisation-Framework-January-2022.pdf

You do not need to notify CQC about individual coronavirus cases in your service. You only need to notify CQC if coronavirus affects the day-to-day running of your business, using the events that stop a service running safely and properly form. But you should continue to send us other notifications as usual.

You must send your notification by email or submit it online.

The Department for Work and Pensions suspended the requirement for fit notes for benefit purposes between 17 December 2021 and 26 January 2022. Claimants whose fit notes expire, and those who make new claims due to a health condition between 17 December and 26 January (and are still ongoing), will need to provide medical evidence from 27 January, and may therefore contact their GP for a fit note in advance of this date. These should be issued.

Fit notes for Statutory Sick Pay purposes will be required for absences that begin on or after 27 January and last for longer than 7 days. Individuals whose sickness began between 10 December and 26 January inclusive will continue to be able to self-certify their absence for up to 28 days.

This is a framework to support the planning and organisation of adult social care during the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak. The CQC want to highlight the ethical framework as a resource that could help providers when making difficult decisions, the principles in it may be transferrable to services they deliver.

The next update from CQC into Capacity Tracker is scheduled for 21^st January 2022. Following this update, users may notice some changes to denominators within reports.

Ransomware attacks on SMEs including social care organisations are on the increase and we expect this to worsen in 2022 as the Log4j vulnerability is identified and exploited by malicious actors.

The Better Security, Better Care programme is seeking to better understand how prepared social care providers are in the event of a cyber-attack and, additionally, how this relates to their DSPT status. We have created a survey that we would encourage you respond to please.

Survey full link: https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/XDP5FMM

A current homecare-focused research project – the SORTED study -is led by Dr Dia Soilemezi from the University of Portsmouth.

We would like to talk to homecare workers and homecare managers as part of the SORTED study. We would like to learn about how they support people living with dementia in looking after their teeth and mouth. This will be helpful in understanding more about people's mouth care needs and the best ways home care workers can help. All participants will receive a £20 gift voucher as a gesture of thank you.

Please get in touch with Dia directly if you would like to receive more information about this project. If you can help, please contact the lead researcher (Dia) to arrange an online or telephone interview (around 20 mins) to discuss your views and experiences. Her email is: dia.soilemezi@port.ac.uk. 

Asylum seekers who have waited over a year for a decision are now able to help ease the care home recruitment crisis following a rule change by the Home Secretary Priti Patel. Up to 32,000 asylum seekers who have been waiting over 12 months are eligible for jobs as care workers, after they were added to the Government’s shortage occupation list:

With the first deadline of 3 February fast approaching, we have some work to do to get our home care workers vaccinated with first dose. Although areas in the Thames Valley are generally better than national figures (although getting worse the nearer London the locality is), 75 out of 150 LA areas are on course to lose more than 20% of home care staff, ie; in these areas, less than 80% staff currently have two doses.

Even allowing for data entry lag etc, that’s a real worry.

And news yesterday that DHSC is reviewing a report that says the Omicron variant weakens the case for compulsory vaccination. This is in the context of growing concerns in the NHS around a projected loss of 70,000 staff. VCOD does not currently include the booster jab, which is the extra push for higher percentage protection.

There is a nationwide community equipment shortage at present which looks like continuing for some time. The shortage is mainly due to supply/ freight issues. To mitigate the risk we want to recycle as much equipment as possible. Please make care staff aware of this so that any unused equipment that they come across can be returned.

This Oxfordshire poster has details of how to contact NRS for a collection and when we have the relevant details for other areas, we will share them.

Skills for Care is looking to to organise some short virtual events with Job Centre Plus and the National Careers Service and are looking for some volunteers.

2 types of events to help with recruitment into the care sector open across Berkshire, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire

The request is could you speak for 10 minutes about working in your part of the sector (care home, home care, supported living or PA) on any of the following dates:

Please reply to Rachel.Reid@skillsforcare.org.uk

Hear how you can claim Workforce Development funding (WDF) to contribute towards the cost of vocational learning such as social care qualifications, learning programmes and digital learning modules.

The session is aimed at managers in care services with responsibility for training and development.

In the session, we will tell you about which qualifications can be funded through WDF this year, the timescales involved, and how to set up or update your Adult Social Care Workforce data set account (ASC-WDS).

Hear how you can claim Workforce Development funding (WDF) to contribute towards the cost of vocational learning such as social care qualifications, learning programmes and digital learning modules.

The session is aimed at managers in care services with responsibility for training and development.

In the session, we will tell you about which qualifications can be funded through WDF this year, the timescales involved, and how to set up or update your Adult Social Care Workforce data set account (ASC-WDS).

Following the government’s announcement on 24 December that care workers will be added to the Health and Care Visa and Shortage Occupation List, Home Office, DHSC and Skills for Care are hosting two webinars – Social Care: Recruiting an overseas care worker under the Points Based System. These 90-minute webinars will provide an overview of the points-based immigration system for the social care sector, what the recent announcement means for international recruitment, how to ensure ethical international recruitment and examples of best practice from the social care sector. Please follow the links to register for one of the dates:

Kavita Vedhara, Prof of Health Psychology at the University of Nottingham, would like to invite you to a free online event which she is organising on behalf of the Association for Psychological Science. She writes:

“I am involved with an event (details below) which I thought may be of interest to you and perhaps your colleagues or other professional contacts. It concerns the 'other side' of behavioural science that often gets neglected when we think about psychological influences on health: namely the panoply of psychological and social factors that influence our risk to viral infections; how our bodies respond to and recover from these infections, and their role in the effectiveness of vaccines. 

We have a stellar line-up of international speakers each of whom will give a brief (5-6 minute) overview of what is known already and what is known/emerging in the context of COVID-19. This will be followed by what we expect to be a lively discussion about what, if anything, this means for how we navigate our way out of this pandemic, plan for future ones and public health more generally. The discussion will be led by the award-winning science journalist David Robson (https://davidrobson.me/), Professor Amy Greer (Canada Research Chair in Population Disease Modelling, University of Guelph, Canada https://ovc.uoguelph.ca/population-medicine/faculty/amy-greer) and Professor Roxane Cohen Silver (Distinguished Professor of Psychological Science, Medicine, and Public Health at the University of California, Irvine; https://faculty.sites.uci.edu/rsilver/)

Public Health England's free Online Physical Activity in Clinical Care Training for registered healthcare professionals (Nurses, OTs, Physios)

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More than 500 people have already attended across Buckinghamshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire.

This training is delivered by a PHE Physical Activity Clinical Champion. CPD certificates are provided after the session.

You'll learn:

Plus hear from your local Active Partnerships about local physical activity opportunities.

If you have any questions or would like more support around physical activity in your role/ team please get in touch with your local Active Partnership lead:

The Menopause is a natural part of ageing that usually occurs between 45 and 55 years of age, as a woman's oestrogen levels decline. In the UK, the average age for a woman to reach the menopause is 51.

Esther McNeile Jones, Locality Lead and Clinical Supervisor for You Matter, will lead a wellbeing session for all social care staff, focusing on how to spot signs, managing symptoms and offer advice on how best to cope during this significant change in life.

Why not join the conversation to help reduce the stigma around menopause, learn more about the symptoms, hear from others and share your experiences in an open and safe online space.

Conversations on Care seminar

The regulation of social care: Improving the treatment of workers through regulatory law’.

If you have trouble accessing the registration form, or have any other queries please email yoland.johnson@gtc.ox.ac.uk

This very useful page brings together all testing guidance for adult social care, including non-regulated services.

The Better Security, Better Care programme will continue throughout 2022/23. We are reviewing current activities, and the availability and format of support will change after March 2022. We strongly encourage you to contact the DSPT team now to access this free support.

If you are based in MK and have not yet been contacted by Bedfordshire Care Association who are leading on this for BLMK ICS area, please let us know and we will signpost you.

DSPT Thames Valley Delivery and Performance Statistics - March 2021 to November 2021

Digital solutions are here to stay! Now is the time to take full advantage of our range of DSPT support and guidance! Contact us via the helpline - 01235 248085 / dspt@oacp.org.uk

COVID-19 infection rates dashboards usually updated weekly:

The Oxfordshire Trusted Assessor service is now closed.

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

Contact: Michelle Yusuf -

The project runs also for Hinchingbrooke and Addenbrookes hospitals.

As well as a constant stream of questions and answers by email from around the country, we are also part of the CAA weekly teleconference - Wednesdays at 10am. 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.

We are adding new colleagues all the time.

Please let us know if there are other colleagues you would like this mailing sent to.

Please tell colleagues and pass on this newsletter.

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

We're now on Twitter.