This year, we launched the all-new CLIC Awards to celebrate the achievements of individuals and teams within our local health and social care system, with a particular focus on improvement and partnership working.
We had a fantastic response, and were overwhelmed with the number and the calibre of nominations we received. An independent judging panel with representatives from across the local system deliberated hard, and were equally delighted to hear about the innovations happening in north and west Cumbria.
At our celebration event on 30 November, we announced which teams, projects and individuals had been selected as our winners, as well as those who had been highly commended.
We were pleased to have Nicola Bailey, Acting Executive Director of Place (North) for North East and North Cumbria (NENC) ICB, join us on the day. Nicola said:
“It was a privilege to attend and to share the afternoon with people who demonstrate an absolute passion for improving the health and well-being of people that live in Cumbria. The event showcased some incredible people and projects, all of which were clearly innovative, person-centred and could demonstrate real impact for communities in Cumbria. The spirit of belonging, commitment and partnership was evident in all the projects, and there is much to learn and share with others about the work underway in Cumbria. I personally learned a lot, met great people, and came away buzzing from the enthusiasm in the room.”
LEARN Category Winner │ Integrated Community Ageing Team (iCAT)
The Integrated Community Ageing Team within Eden Primary Care Network (PCN) have developed a three-tier service in their PCN to support a more personalised care agenda and to help ensure equity of care across the population. They were nominated because of their commitment to compassionate patient centred care, and every one of the team has worked tirelessly to achieve their vision.
LEARN Category Highly Commended │ ‘How Safe Do You Feel?’ Initiative
This initiative has been led by Kelly Marsden and the North Cumbria Integrated Care NHS Foundation Trust (NCIC) safeguarding team in collaboration with NENC ICB, Victim Support, and Cumbria Police. The team have adopted a system-wide training and awareness raising project in respect of domestic abuse, ensuring that all health contacts count and that patients are routinely asked how safe they feel.
CONNECT Category Winner │ LINK Cumbria
LINK Cumbria is a children and young people’s social prescribing service, funded by Keswick and Solway, Eden, and Longtown and Brampton PCNs. The team offer much-needed wellbeing support to young people aged 5-19 in north Cumbria, launching during lockdown in 2020, and they have since received over 350 referrals, with the vast majority of those accepted.
CONNECT Category Highly Commended │ Home Office Asylum Seeker Service
This service is a collaboration led by Cumbria Health on Call (CHoC) with NENC ICB and daytime practices, as well as with SERCO. Since early 2022, CHOC have been involved in providing a health needs assessment for asylum seekers arriving in Cumbria, which involve an initial physical and mental health check, providing the opportunity for asylum seekers to disclose and discuss any physical or psychological health issues, safeguarding issues or violence they have experienced in their home country or on journey to UK, as well as any chronic or ongoing health needs.
IMPROVE Category Winner │ Learning Disability Annual Health Checks / Health Action Plan
The Learning Disability Annual Health Checks/Health Action Plan project has been led by Kate Holliday (NENC ICB) in collaboration with partners including People First Independent Advocacy, NCIC, Cumbria County Council, SEND Alliance Cumbria, Spencer Street Surgery, Copeland Primary Care Network, NHSE/I and CNTW. Annual Health Checks for people with a learning disability, which result in the production of a Health Action Plan are incredibly important. A Health Action Plan identifies an individual’s health needs, what will happen about these needs, who will help, and when this will be reviewed. They ensure those people with a learning disability are receiving the very best care.
IMPROVE Category Highly Commended │ North Cumbria Opioid Workstream
The North Cumbria Opioid Workstream has been led by Helena Gregory (NENC ICB) in collaboration with partners. The team identified a higher volume of opioid prescribing for people in north Cumbria and associated risks to people, particularly those taking higher doses or combinations. The collaboration has come together around a common problem in a safe space, keeping the patient at the heart, and valuing all members of the team equally. During this time, the number of people taking opioids in north Cumbria has decreased by 20%.
OUTSTANDING INDIVIDUAL Winner │ Jane Macfarlane, North Cumbria Living With & Beyond Cancer Project Coordinator, Cumbria CVS
Living With and Beyond Cancer (LWBC) works with the Northern Cancer Alliance, Macmillan, and the local system-wide planning group to plan and deliver a range of personalised care and recovery support services for people affected by cancer in north Cumbria. The project commenced in 2018 on a tiny budget and has produced, thanks to Jane, some amazing services regularly supporting 50+ people each month. Jane has worked tirelessly over the last 4 years to build deep and lasting connections across the whole health and care system in north Cumbria.
OUTSTANDING INDIVIDUAL Highly Commended │ Margaret Lowis, Control Room Manager, CHoC
Margaret is one of the original CHoC employees, starting as a call-handler in 1996. Margaret has from the start been invested in the organisation, keen to ensure the right service is offered to patients. Embracing change, expanding the scope of service, becoming the Control Room Manager and being a ‘constant’ through challenging times have been Margaret’s key characteristics. Margaret is leaving CHoC in November, leaving a great legacy, and her colleagues are thankful to the dedication and commitment that she has given.
SYSTEM RECOGNITION AWARD Winner │ Sarah Thompson & Jenny Benson, Cumbria Community Foundation
Cumbria Community Foundation exists to address disadvantage in Cumbria by making life-changing grants and promoting philanthropy. Over the past three years, both Jenny and Sarah have worked hard to build connectivity with our health and social care sector. They have demonstrated how effectively they can partner with NHS commissioners and funders to develop donor advised grant programmes focused on stimulating innovative new projects enabling third sector resources to contribute to system working.
SYSTEM RECOGNITION AWARD Winner │ Clare Edwards, Health Partnerships Manager & the Third Sector Referral Coordinator Team at Cumbria CVS
Clare joined Cumbria CVS in 2019, and since then has clearly promoted cross-sector collaboration and partnerships, brokered mutually beneficial relationships across third sector, health, and social care sectors, and has ensured connectivity between the third sector and our statutory partners.
The Third Sector Referral Coordinator Team at Cumbria CVS work within the north Cumbria Integrated Care Community (ICC) hubs to promote third sector services and connect patients and carers to third sector organisations. They keep up-to-date knowledge and information about services, and work alongside the professional of the day and other senior hub staff to proactively identify patients who would benefit from support.
CLIC RECOGNITION AWARD Winner │ Sue Gallagher, Patient Experience Voice
Sue Gallagher is a service user representative and a volunteer, but is also much more… She has worked alongside CLIC for 8 years, and has been involved with so many different projects. She has gone on to work and represent the patient voice for north Cumbria on a system platform. She ensures the patient’s perspective is raised, making sure that patient’s values, needs, and concerns are considered at all stages of service delivery, treatment, and care.
We would also like to take this opportunity to acknowledge all the other brilliant nominations we received. Our judging panel had a tough job choosing the winners, which is testament to the quality of the improvement work happening across north and west Cumbria:
The Health Pathways Team, for their huge amount of work in localising pathways for the north Cumbria system, which provides all primary and secondary care clinicians with one place for the pathway guidance that they need to manage patients and access further services. Find out more about community health pathways here…
The Jigsaw Bereavement Team, for establishing Forget-Me-Not Day, a remembrance event focused on building relationships with service users and their families to embed an improving approach to support families after the death of their child.
The Elm C Team (NCIC), for the compassion, hard work and determination they have demonstrated over the last 12 months.
The Cancer Centre Living With and Beyond Cancer Support Volunteers, for supporting people when receiving chemotherapy, signposting to community services, and connecting with regular support calls.
The North East and North Cumbria Public Health Prevention in Maternity Programme, which aims to support local areas to reduce the risk of health inequalities and unwarranted variation by working in partnership, improving the quality of support available to women and their families in the perinatal period.
Claire Bainbridge, Catherine Eccles & Louise Willis (NCIC), for their work promoting the ICON initiative (to prevent shaken babies) across services.
Sarah Farragher (Home First & System Flow Coordinator – NENC ICB, Cumbria County Council, NCIC), who has worked exceptionally hard in an extremely difficult environment to bring together ‘system partners’ operating across north Cumbria to work in a more collaborative approach, improving outcomes for residents being discharged from hospital.
Mike Wigham, Samantha McClean & Lynne Nixon (Adult Education Carlisle, Cumbria County Council), for their work with Cumbria, Northumberland, Tyne and Wear NHS Foundation Trust (CNTW) to provide a supportive Art for Wellbeing group for carers who are experiencing strain or are at risk of family breakdown.
Gabby Stephenson-Bell (Every Life Matters), who worked with CNTW to provide sessions for those who are caring for someone who is expressing suicidal ideations, and who felt fear and frustration and that they did not have the skills to support their loved ones.
The PRIMIS Informatics Team (NCIC), for their boundaryless approach and collaboratively work across organisations and departments to identify and implement positive improvements to benefit their service users and in turn patient care.
Home First Cumberland Infirmary and West Cumberland Hospital, who have worked relentlessly over the past 6 months to streamline pathways and reduce inequalities across sites, whilst also maintaining a high-quality service for assessment and discharge at the front door in a time where the NHS is facing significant pressures.
The North East and North Cumbria Suicide Prevention Network, for its overarching multi-agency shared values and approach, aiming to help enhance and support all suicide prevention activity across the region. You can find out more about the Network here…
Fiona Evans (Specialist Nurse, NCIC), for her work promoting menopause awareness and skills for clinicians in the Community Bladder and Bowel service and endeavouring to improve the menopause policy for employees of the Trust. You can find out more about Fiona’s work here…
Charlotte Pace (Lead Facilitator, Institute for Voluntary Action Research) & the Copeland Community Stroke Prevention Project team, for their work to help improve the rate of strokes in certain wards in Copeland. Find out more about the project here…
North Cumbria Cancer Care Collaborative & Jose Hodgkins (Chair), for their work across the system, engaging with patients, clinicians and specialists with the aim of improving cancer care in north Cumbria. You can find out more about the Collaborative here…
NCIC Podiatry Team and Clinical Educators, who have increased the number of student placement hours (achieving almost double their target), improved team morale and engagement, and updated patient information freeing-up clinicians to see more patients.
Those involved in the Community Ear Wax Service, which has enabled patients to access an ear wax removal service close to home at no cost.
Julie Cameron (Mental Health & Learning Disability Co-ordinator, NENC ICB), who has worked tirelessly to improve outcomes for patients, improving processes and challenging decisions that she does not feel are in the interest of the patient.
The Tier 3 Weight Management Service, which has meant that local people can now access appropriate services, and patients are no longer disadvantaged by distance to travel or general lack of provision when seeking support to change their lifestyle.
Sheela Vara (NECS), Vicky Lamonby & team (NCIC), for their work on targeted lung health checks which are offered to people at high risk of lung cancer, creating faster pathways that will lead to better lung cancer outcomes.
The team involved in setting up and providing the Post Covid Service, which was set-up within an extremely tight timescale, under challenging circumstances, and continues to support patients with managing their condition as they recover.
The north and west Cumbria podiatry collaboration, who have shown significant resilience and supporting service improvement initiatives by working collaboratively to improve patient experience and quality of care.
Amanda Sutton-Heaton (NCIC), whose work ensures that everyone’s ‘superpower’ is recognised, that our workforce is truly diverse, that staff feel valued and respected, that staff to feel brave and speaking up about concerns, helping to create a system for safe and compassionate patient care.
Fiona Chatten (NENC ICB), due to her level of commitment and passion around recruiting and retaining GPs within the north Cumbria region.
Amanda Dunkley (NCIC) & Caroline Hastings (NWAS), for their invaluable and commendable work with regards to collaborative international and domestic recruitment for the north Cumbria region.
Vanessa Connor & Angie Reynolds (NCIC), for their work to exemplify all that is best about putting the patient at the heart of what they do, wrapping around the appropriate services, and then joining up silos to make things happen.
Kate Allen & Amanda Green (NENC ICB), who in preparation to implement the changes outlined in Liberty Protection Safeguards, have collaborated effectively to develop a rapid improvement plan, demonstrating a high level of determination, compassion, tenacity, and leadership.
Kate Holliday (NENC ICB), who as the LeDeR Champion has raised the profile of people with learning disabilities, challenging partners to improve care, and also created a safe space for staff to raise concerns.
We would like to thank all of you for your hard work and dedication to improving care for patients and service users. Your enthusiasm and passion for the work you do shines through, and together we can improve the health of our population and address the inequalities that individuals face.
Remember, you can share your improvement stories with us all year round…
We know that learning from the work of others is vital in quality improvement, and we’re here to support you to share your story far and wide.
In collaboration with North Cumbria Knowledge and Library Service, we hold monthly, virtual Lunch and Learn sessions, where our guest speaker gives a short talk sharing their experience of improvement work.
We are also able to capture case studies on an ad-hoc basis, which can be shared via the CLIC website and social media platforms, giving you the opportunity to celebrate your achievements.
If you are interested in either of these opportunities, please get in touch with us: [email protected]
