Welcome to June’s edition of our Health and Social Care Partnership’s (HSCP) Partnership Matters Briefing. I hope that you enjoyed reading our launch briefing last month, and that you continue to find this month’s useful in keeping you up to date with some of the work that’s happening with partners across our HSCP. It’s just one of the ways in which we’ll continue to communicate with people about health and social care here in Glasgow. Suggestions for future editions are always welcome, and feel free to email them to us at GCHSCP_Communications@glasgow.gov.uk.

In this month’s briefing there’s an update on one of our transformational change programmes that you may have heard about – Maximising Independence. Maximising Independence is about us changing the way that we work with our partners and the people who we support to help them to remain living at home safely for as long as possible with the right support in place for them and their carers. It was recently discussed at our Integration Joint Board’s (IJB) meeting this week. We’ll continue to provide updates on Maximising Independence in future editions.

The IJB also discussed its unaudited Annual Accounts, which is now publicly available to view, as well as its Annual Performance Report (APR) for 2020 – 21. This year’s APR is different than previous ones. It also considers how the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has impacted on our health and social care services and describes how we’ve responded. I think you’ll agree with me that this year’s APR reflects the breadth of dedication and commitment of our staff and partners across our service areas in keeping our patients, service users, carers and their families supported at a time when they’ve needed our support even more. Please take some time to read it.

There’s no question that the pandemic has impacted our lives in many ways over the past year, whether at work or at home in our communities. Unfortunately, some of us may have lost a family member, friend or colleague during this time, or know of someone who has. The pandemic has highlighted the importance of timely bereavement support and information that’s friendly, empathetic and accessible. We recently worked with partners to develop a dedicated section on our Your Support Your Way Glasgow website with information on bereavement services and support.

In this month’s briefing we also include recent news articles that are available on our HSCP’s website, as well as upcoming events and meetings. You can read them by selecting their relevant link.

We also provide an update on how we continue to respond to and manage the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our health and social care services, and work that we’ve been progressing around the recovery / renewal of services. And this month’s briefing features Janet McCullough, our Head of Children’s Services (South), in our Senior Management Team video, in which she talks about some of the ways that her teams have been supporting children and young people and their families during the pandemic.

May was a difficult month for Glasgow, when we had a significant increase in COVID-19 cases spurred by the more transmissible Delta variant, and it saw us not joining most of the country in further reducing restrictions. This meant a pause on us being able to mix with family and friends within our homes, and a slower return to business within our city’s hospitality sector. I’m sure that the easing of restrictions at the beginning of June with us moving to Level 2 has been welcomed, and I hope that we’ve all felt a bit more of normality returning to our lives.

Quicker access to the COVID-19 Vaccination Programme and testing (both symptomatic and asymptomatic), along with Government and Public Health guidelines and restrictions, are all contributing to help us suppress the virus and manage its impact on our health and social care services. And we’re seeing welcome signs of vaccinations reducing the percentage of people who require hospital admission.

More importantly, though, it’s coming down to each and everyone one of us playing our part to keep ourselves and others safe – by taking opportunities to get vaccinated, by participating in testing and by following government and public health guidelines and restrictions, particularly around physical distancing, hygiene and the wearing of face coverings. Individually and together we’ve been making a big difference in suppressing the virus.

However, as we’ve seen, cases remain high and outbreaks and new variants can happen very quickly and impact on the gains that we’ve made. Although we’ve had restrictions eased, we need to continue to do all that we can do to help suppress the virus and keep ourselves and others safe. It’s so important that we keep our guard up.

Up-to-date information on COVID-19 and the Vaccination Programme continues to be available on the NHS Inform website. All of Glasgow’s local COVID-19 test sites are also available for both asymptomatic (without symptoms) and symptomatic (with symptoms) testing. Full list of locations are at https://maps.test-and-trace.nhs.uk/, and tests can be booked by going to https://www.gov.uk/get-coronavirus-test. The UK Government is providing the test kits as part of its testing programme.

Over the past year I’ve expressed how grateful and thankful myself and our HSCP’s Senior Management Team are for the incredible dedication and commitment of our staff and partners across the public, independent and third sectors in keeping the health and social care needs of our city supported during the pandemic, and a number of times I’ve tried to come up with different ways of expressing this. The point is, we couldn’t have done it, and continue to do it, if it wasn’t for our staff and partners – who they are and what they do day-in and day-out. They are what makes Glasgow uniquely Glasgow, and we’ll continue to be ever so proud.

Summer is now upon us, and I hope that you get the chance to enjoy a break if not now then at some point over the next few months.

Susanne