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News

Chris Jones and Helen Dredge stood in front of a tree in a car park with a blue electric bike

Electric bike piloted as part of commitment to sustainable healthcare

As part of efforts to deliver healthcare more sustainably a First Community colleague will trial using an electric bike for work related travel.

Chris Jones, Health Visitor clinical lead, will pilot using the bike for her commute and travel to and from different bases for meetings, as part of the organisation’s efforts to provide healthcare in a more environmentally friendly way.

Care home resident with Red Bag

Red Bag Scheme introduced across east Surrey to support care home residents admitted to hospital

On Monday 20 February, the Red Bag Scheme (often known as The Hospital Transfer Pathway) was introduced to east Surrey care homes, to improve the experience for residents admitted to hospital.

East Surrey care home residents admitted to hospital in an emergency will now have a red bag with them displaying their name, care home contact details and essential items including:

Elderly gentleman being treated by a district nurse

First Community Health and Care Urgent Community Response (UCR) Service treats 734 patients within the first year

The UCR service is a team of multiskilled health professionals who provide an urgent response in the community to east Surrey residents for conditions such as falls, dizziness, chest pain (non-cardiac origin) and urinary tract infection.  From December 2021 to December 2022 the team have treated over 734 patients!  Often patients are elderly and have other conditions which makes treatment more complex. The UCR team are trained to provide a holistic approach to care for such patients.

Group A Strep (GAS)

Information on invasive Group A Streptococcus

We have identified a small number of our patients who have developed an infection called invasive Group A Streptococcus (also known as invasive Strep A). This page gives some more information and general advice about this infection.

Group A streptococcus (GAS) 

Group A streptococcus (GAS) – also known as Streptococcus pyogenes – are bacteria that can be found in the throat and on the skin. People may carry GAS and have no symptoms of illness or may develop infection. 

How GAS is spread 

Surrey Heartlands Health and Care Partnership Logo

Update: Surrey Heartlands moves out of business continuity incident

On Saturday 7 January 2023, the Surrey Heartlands health and care system moved from a critical incident into a business continuity incident. This was in place until 12 January 2023, when the system moved out of business continuity incident. This reflected a significant amount of work by teams across the system, resulting in an improved position. Although First Community services remain extremely busy, they are currently working as usual.