When we had to suspend and change some of our services due to COVID-19, our teams had to find new ways of caring for you. Our face to face Children’s Community Nursing Team started using OneConsultation to do assessments over video.
It starts with a triage call to decide whether someone really needs to visit in person – and we’re working with our other consultants, such as dieticians, to make sure that if a home visit is needed, only one person needs to do this, to help minimise risks.
Only essential emergency home visits are made and the rest are done using a video consultation.
Video calls have so far been an invaluable tool to help us instantly how a child is doing, and not just rely on descriptions over the phone.
On one particular call, our consultants were concerned that a child looked unwell, and made the decision to call a GP. A first responder visited before calling out an ambulance. The child was seen to quickly and was thankfully doing well after a quick check up.
In another example, a family who were trained in using a gastric tube did have a couple of questions and were able to speak to one of our community nurses for some reassurance that what they were doing was right. The little one even held up their arms for a virtual cuddle, so it has been good for nurses and families to be able to see each other.
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