My Placement Experience!

Apologies for the extremely late blog post about my placement experience!
I finished my placement on Friday 28th August 2015 and had a lovely lunch with colleagues to celebrate my twelve months at the CCG!
Since leaving the CCG, I have been settling back into university life and working towards final year deadlines!

I can’t believe how quickly my twelve months on placement has gone! Deciding to do a placement as part of the third year of my Business Degree has been one of the best decisions I have made and I am so grateful that I have had the opportunity to gain invaluable, practical experience and develop a range of skills while being an undergraduate!

Working at NHS Eastern Cheshire Clinical Commissioning Group has been a great start to working life! I have gained an understanding of the complex structure of the NHS and the crucial role which CCGs play within the health economy.

I was predominately based in the Quality Team during my twelve months on placement. Quality improvement and Performance was something I had never come across prior to my placement, however my role as a Commissioning and Quality Officer enabled me to develop a range of new skills and knowledge about improving the quality of patient care across local Providers. I had the opportunity to assist with implementing quality incentive schemes and monitored the progress of the schemes which we set at the start of the financial year.

I was lucky enough to gain experience in a range of areas at the CCG in addition to Quality & Performance, including; Contracting, Finance, Clinical Project Management, Communications, Recruitment and Transformation.

Projects/achievements while on placement;
• Achieved Prince2 Foundation Qualification
• Implemented a number of Quality Incentive Schemes (CQUINs) and monitored the progress of each indicator
• Updated the Quality Schedules to be included in the 2015/16 Contracts
• Created new section on CCG's website to demonstrate our Performance against statutory NHS standards
• Produced the Contracts for Providers of the AMD (Age-related Macular Degeneration) service
• Assisted the Finance Team with checking and coding invoices and also matching CHC/FNC invoices for payment
• Gained certificates from HFMA (Healthcare of Financial Management Association) for introduction to NHS Finance
• Created the application packs, including Job Descriptions & Person Specifications for a number of new posts at the CCG
• Conducted interviews along with colleagues for new posts at the CCG
• Produced a couple of Health Matters columns that were published in local newspapers
• Explored the viability of creating a mobile phone App to assist colleagues in health and social care working with MCA DoLS (Mental Capacity Act Deprivation of Liberty Safeguards) and produced a Business Case for potential App
• Assisted the Transformation Team with writing a Business Case for the procurement of new Risk Stratification Tool
• Helped to produce the report from the ADHD & Autism workshop
• Took part in 'The Great CCG Bake Off'!!!

What really struck me whilst working for the NHS was that all colleagues I had the opportunity of working with, all had the same passion and dedication towards commissioning the highest quality of healthcare services for the local population.

Everyone I have worked with over the past twelve months has been extremely helpful and supportive and I can’t thank them enough!

I would just like to say a massive THANK YOU to everyone at Eastern Cheshire CCG for making it a year to remember and I hope to see you all again soon!

Thanks again!

Emma

Welcoming our new student and Evaluating our Trust's performance!

3rd August - 7th August 2015

After a very relaxing holiday in Spain, I returned to my final few weeks on placement! On Monday, our new student; Katie started her twelve month placement at the CCG. Katie will be replacing me when I leave and will perform the role of a 'Commissioning & Quality Officer'. Over the past week, my main duties have been to ensure Katie settles into her new work environment and to make sure she is aware of the crucial role a CCG plays within the local health economy. We have been going through work which I have been involved in over the past twelve months on placement and I have tried to provide her with advice about working at a CCG as a student. Hopefully I have provided her with the right support during her first week!

As well as welcoming Katie into the CCG, we have also been evaluating evidence for the quarter 1 CQUIN (Commissioning for Quality & Innovation) milestones from ECT (East Cheshire Trust). Myself and Katie have been going through each piece of evidence in detail to determine if the Trust has achieved each agreed milestone. This was an interesting task for me, as I assisted with the initial implementation of the CQUINs and I have now gained experience of monitoring the performance of the Trust. Katie and I then compared notes with our Manager; Andrew to mutually agree whether or not we felt the milestones had been achieved. If the evidence the Trust has provided is not sufficient, we contact the lead of each CQUIN to ask for further evidence and information to be submitted.

Writing for the local newspapers!

13th July - 17th July 2015

While I only have an about five weeks remaining on placement, I was really keen to gain some experience with the Communications and Public Engagement Team before I leave the CCG. I worked relatively closey with the Team last week and attended various meetings. One meeting in particular, was regarding posters and leaflets which will be produced to to promote the CCG’s HealthVoice group, which meets every two months and provides a public view on the healthcare services in Eastern Cheshire.

The Team also asked me to write an article focusing on the subject of staying safe abroad, which will be published as part of the weekly ‘Health Matters’ column in the local newspapers. Writing the article was a great experience as I gained new knowledge about the importance of staying safe abroad, but it also challenged me to utilise my A-Level English skills and write an informative piece for a large audience; hopefully my English Teacher would be proud! You can view the article online by clicking here.
I was keen to gain experience in Communications and Public Engagement while still at the CCG, as I will be studying a marketing module when I return to University for my final year, so being exposed to how the Team communicates with the public and produces marketing material to promote the organisation has been really interesting to be involved in.

This week, I have also been teaching a few different people how to set up and use a blog! A Community Matron from Bollington asked if I would help set up her blogging profile, in order for her to document to colleagues the progression of integrated care in Eastern Cheshire. I also helped our new placement student; Amy (Transformation Programme Support Officer) set up a blog and provided her with my top tips when producing a blog! Although I am no blog expert, it was great to provide knowledge and support to colleagues wishing to enter the blogging world!

Experience in HR!

6th July – 10th July 2015

We have been recruiting for a Quality & Performance Analyst at CCG and I was given the opportunity to gain some more experience in the recruitment field of business! I have been involved in the shortlisting of applications and I was lucky enough to sit on the panel when we interviewed candidates on Monday. It was great to gain some practical HR (Human Resource) experience because I have chosen to study Strategic Human Resource Management when I return to university in September, so I am trying to get as much exposure to the recruitment process in the NHS as possible. It was also really interesting to gain more of an idea of what recruiters are looking for and identify what I must include on my CV when applying for graduate positions. I have learnt just how important work experience is, along with a degree and good qualifications. Work experience is extremely important when recruiting and I am sure my twelve month placement at the CCG will be of benefit when applying for graduate positions in the future.

I have also attended numerous meetings and events this week. An interesting event in particular, was held at the Town Hall on Wednesday, which invited all GPs and Practice Managers to discuss the new Contract that will be used in Primary Care. Although, I have been working on Contracts for Secondary Care Providers, such as CWP (Cheshire & Wirral Partnership) I was made aware that the structure of Primary Care Contracts are slightly different, which is something I am interested in finding a bit more about before I finish my placement.

Finally, to round off the week nicely, I was given the opportunity to present the new Quality & Performance section on the CCG’s website to members of the Clinical Quality & Performance Committee, where I gave members an update on the progress of the new section and the elements that are included. It also was great to hear members’ thoughts, in terms of what may need to be added to the new section.
You can visit our new page by clicking on the following link; https://www.easterncheshireccg.nhs.uk/Our-Performance/

Showcasing our Performance!

29th June - 3rd July 2015

Over the past few weeks, myself and a member of the Communications Team have been working with the CSU (Commissioning Support Unit) to create a new Quality & Performance section on the CCG’s website, where we are able to share with the public our performance dashboards and penalties we apply to Providers who have not met our performance targets.

We have produced an initial background page which provides the visitor with an overall summary of how we measure quality and performance at the CCG and where the data is sourced from. The visitor is also able to select a particular performance dashboard from the drop-down box, which provides a list of months that the visitor can choose from.

I have now been granted access to edit the Performance page and upload documents, which is another skill to add to my list! You can view our new Performance page by clicking on the following link; https://www.easterncheshireccg.nhs.uk/Our-Performance/

On Friday, I attended my last Locality meeting, before I leave in August. The meetings are held on a bi-monthly basis and invite colleagues from Primary Care; GPs and Practice Managers and allows new services to be presented and questions/concerns to be answered. The CCG facilitates the meeting and we discuss current work streams and projects. The meeting on Friday involved a number of presentations from colleagues at the council and social care, providing us with insightful information of services that have recently been formed. These services have been created to provide patients within the East Cheshire area with support for different long-term conditions; we had presentations from services supporting Dementia, patient’s wellbeing and helping to return to work after an illness.

Passing Prince2!

22nd June - 26th June 2015

Over the past few weeks I have been working my way through online training of the PRINCE2 (PRojects IN Controlled Environments) foundation course. Prince 2 is a project management methodology, which incorporates seven principles, themes and processes, that should help to control and manage any project, regardless of its size. Learning the Prince2 project management methodology has been invaluable, it will be of great use when I return to university, but also in future job roles.

The course requires you to work your way through the online training at your own speed, with an exam at the end of the course. On Tuesday, I sat the Prince2 Foundation exam and I am pleased to say that I passed!! I am very grateful that I was given the opportunity to complete the course whilst on placement. After a year of not doing any revision or exams, Prince2 has been a great way to get me back into revision mode, just before returning to university in September!

Getting involved in Clinical Projects at the CCG!

1st June - 5th June 2015

Apologies for the lack of blog posts recently! I have just returned from a very relaxing Greek getaway, so this week I have been catching up on various tasks.

Before I went on holiday, I was assisting the Clinical Team with producing a report from the ADHD and Autism workshop, which the CCG hosted, along with colleagues from South Cheshire CCG and the local voluntary Organisations. The report outlines the results from the activities we took part in during the workshop and the project work that has begun since the workshop took place. The report will be sent out to various members of the local Health and Social Care network once complete.

I have really enjoyed getting involved in this Clinical area of work, as I have been able to gain an understanding of how projects at the CCG are coordinated. I have been involved in collating the results from the workshop and I've attended various meetings to discuss the next steps for this project. We are currently in the process of determining the gaps within the ADHD and Autism pathway to identify what support needs to be provided in future.

I am looking forward to seeing how this project progresses before I finish my placement in August!