Weekly News
Released on 04/05/2009
Events Diary
5 May & 6 MayIHM Scotland
Employment Law...what’s new?
1.30-4pm, Millennium Hotel, Glasgow (5th) and Norton House Hotel, Edinburgh (6th)
Last chance to book! Increase and update your knowledge of employment law at these two afternoon seminars. Essential for anyone who manages people and teams. Call Hilary Iannotti on 01292 440 395 to book or fax back attached form.
20 May & 2 June
4 & 18 June
IHM Scotland
Project Management
9.30-4pm, Glasgow, Inverness
See attached flyers for course content and booking.
21 & 22 May
NHS Education for Scotland
Enhancing Your Practice:
Networking and Learning for Practice Managers Annual
Conference
Crieff Hydro Hotel
See www.nes.scot.nhs.uk/events.
6 & 7 October
IHM Scotland
Annual Conference
Airth Castle Hotel
Programme information available shortly: put in your diary today.
This week in Parliament
Wednesday
10:00 Health and Sport CommitteeIn its continuing inquiry into child and adolescent mental health services, the Committee will take evidence from Shona Robison MSP, Minister for Public Health and Sport, Adam Ingram MSP, Minister for Children and Early Years, Lesley Fraser, Deputy Director for Safer Children, Stronger Families, Margo Fyfe, CAMHS Nurse Advisor, and Geoff Huggins, Deputy Director, Head Mental Health Division, Scottish Government.
17:00 Members’ Business – Mary Scanlon (Con, Highlands & Islands): International Midwives’ Day, 5 May 2009
That the Parliament notes that 5 May is International Midwives’ Day 2009; welcomes the contribution that midwives make to the health and wellbeing of women and their babies in Scotland and around the world; recognises that levels of maternal and infant mortality, especially in the developing world, are unacceptable; believes that achieving UN Millennium Development Goal 4 (Reduce child mortality) and Goal 5 (Improve maternal health) would amount to a giant leap for better maternal and infant health globally; acknowledges that more can always be done in Scotland to reduce our own levels of maternal and infant mortality, especially in remote and rural areas; supports greater international action to reduce maternal and infant deaths globally, and strives to provide ever-safer care for Scotland’s own women and children.
Thursday
11:40 General Question TimeJackie Baillie (Lab, Dumbarton): for what reason is the family planning and well woman clinic being withdrawn from Dumbarton Health Centre; Charlie Gordon (Lab, Glasgow Cathcart): whether the Scottish Government is considering funding part of the Clyde Fastlink project to enable it to serve the Southern General Hospital.
12:00 First Minister’s Questions
Swine flu statement
The full text of the Cabinet Secretary for Health and Wellbeing’s statement to the Scottish Parliament last week on Swine Flu AH1N1 can be read at www.scottish.parliament.uk/business/officialReports/meetingsParliament/or-09/sor0429-02.htm#Col16816.
New Scottish IHM Fellowships awarded
Four Scottish practice managers have achieved
Fellowship of the Institute of Health Management, which recognises excellence at a high level of health management practice. Congratulations to Jane Connechen, Practice
Manager with Dr Fellows and Partners, Dumfries; Rowena Boome, Practice Manager, Aberfoyle Medical Practice; Mary Freel from the Crescent Medical Practice; and Sandra Ross of Aird Medical Practice, all of whom took part in a pilot
programme offering a new route to achieving IHM
Fellowship.
Sandra explains why she decided to undertake the
Fellowship pilot and what she gained from it:
“I became a member of IHM after successfully completing the Practice Managers Vocational Training Scheme and this gave me the desire and confidence to develop my
management skills further. I took on the role of Network & Learning Co-ordinator in Highland in September 2007 and knew when this affordable Fellowship pilot opportunity was advertised I wanted to complete it. I find learning and
developing my skills exciting and it gives me confidence and a real sense of achievement when successfully
completed. IHM is a nationally recognised Institute who specialise in healthcare management so you know you are gaining relevant and up-to-date expertise and knowledge when you complete educational challenges with them.”
Mary cites the significant changes to general practice and the need to maintain and update skills to facilitate those changes as her motivation for undertaking the pilot.
“I had considered the Fellowship by assessment route
previously,” she says, “but felt that this involved the
practice, whereas the pilot scheme was an opportunity to be recognised for the contribution that I make to the
practice. I saw this as an ideal part of my personal
development and an opportunity to reflect on and assess my own contribution.”
Rowena had worked in general practice for 30 years and was a long-standing member of IHM, so she jumped at the chance to achieve Fellowship. “I found the challenge
interesting and rewarding whilst acquiring all the evidence necessary for the domains.” she explains. “I felt it gave me a chance to reflect on all the different aspects of general practice as well as the many varied facets I have
encountered.”
Following completion of the pilot, IHM’s revised Fellowship programme will be launched in October this year. To find out more, go to www.ihm.org.uk/membership/fellowship.
NHS board deficit to be cleared
The Scottish Government is providing resources of £3.1 million to NHS Western Isles to clear a deficit built up in previous years. The NHS board has balanced its books over the past 2 years and the government has now agreed a forward financial plan.
Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon said: "NHS Western Isles has already come a long way to turn around its financial situation and we want to give the Board a fresh start so that it can lay strong foundations for the future.
"Today's agreement is recognition of the progress that has been made so far and means progress can be made in a manageable way that is fair to the Board and ensures patient services will not be affected."
The Board will have to repay the brokerage over the six financial years beginning in 2012-13.
Budget means ‘£129m cut’ for NHS Scotland
Health Secretary Nicola Sturgeon told MSPs last week that a baseline cut to the NHS capital budget in England, along with the ‘efficiency savings’ announced in Chancellor Alastair Darling’s Budget will result in “sustained year-on-year cuts to the health budget in Scotland.”
In response to a question by Lothians MSP, Ian McKee, about the potential effect on waiting times, Ms Sturgeon said that the cut was “serious and potentially damaging” but that the Scottish Government would “work extremely hard to protect health services...and to ensure that patients continue to receive speedy access to good-quality treatment”
