Covid-19 Update 30/03

Posted on March 30th, 2020

Good Afternoon
Once again we hope everyone is adhering to the government social distancing guidelines. Fantastic to see the local Spar putting things in place to keep those in the village and themselves safe. We have also noticed the tree is lit up in the evening, what a lovely touch, its fantastic to see such community spirit during these difficult times.

With regards to the Surgery, things continue as they have been. GP’s will only be making telephone calls and video consultations to keep the risk to a minimum. We would appreciate your continued support in allowing the surgery to deal with urgent cases only over the incoming weeks. This has been working extremely well since the last update, unfortunately we had been inundated with regular queries from patients making it really difficult to deal with the acutely ill patients. By all means if you feel you are ill, particularly those at risk, then contact us and we will certainly arrange a call with the GP. Admin work will be on hold for the foreseeable, unless relating to benefits or something essential. We wont be processing holiday cancellation forms at this time, you should be in a position to claim a refund directly from your travel agent/airline.

From the information provided to us, only urgent necessary referrals are being dealt with at the hospitals ie suspected cancer, so please be patient as everything may be on hold for a few months. Under these circumstances it is to be expected and im sure everyone will be understanding of this.

We are awaiting confirmation that the staff will also have to work the Easter bank holidays in line with the rest of the NHS due to the growing pressures on the service. We will keep you updated regarding this.

We would like to extend our thanks to Ceri Jones who has very kindly helped the surgery and some of our vulnerable patients. We have been in great need of volunteer support over the last week so if anyone would like to volunteer and give their details to the practice so we can link you in with the vulnerable patients ie those who need transport to appointments, food, medication delivered etc. This would be a huge help.

We would hope letters have started to be delivered from the government to those patients being asked to isolate completely for the 12weeks, as it stands we are awaiting confirmation on this. At the moment we are advising patients to follow the government guidance regarding isolation. So please if you have any queries about isolating refer to the following websites
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-stay-at-home-guidance/stay-at-home-guidance-for-households-with-possible-coronavirus-covid-19-infection

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/covid-19-guidance-on-social-distancing-and-for-vulnerable-people/guidance-on-social-distancing-for-everyone-in-the-uk-and-protecting-older-people-and-vulnerable-adults

We continue to work closely with the local pharmacy, we would like to thank all the staff for their hard work and dedication, obviously they are also at risk with patient contact, so please bear this in mind when visiting the pharmacy and adhere to their distancing guidance. The more safe we can keep all staff in the surgery and the pharmacy the longer we can continue to deliver the services in the village.

We have been very lucky to date with the number of remaining staff, currently we are without 1 GP for the next couple of weeks, 1 GP is working from home and 2 admin staff are off. So if we can continue to keep the risk minimalised hopefully we will be able to keep the staff numbers we have in place.

As we have mentioned previously, if you have an elderly neighbour or someone with no support network close by, please make some form of contact with them, should it be a wave in the window, a telephone call or a little note through their door just to let them know you are there to help should they need it. We are also available to help any of our vulnerable patients so if you are concerned about anyone then please don’t hesitate to get in touch with us.

Practice emails will continue to be available for patients to cancel appointments and order prescriptions, any other queries should go through the surgery telephone on 0151 327 4593.

Continue to stay safe……

Best Wishes
Everyone at Willaston Surgery