OT Week and The Impact of COVID-19: Michelle Eiles - Adult Social Care and Reablement
The COVID-19 pandemic has affected us all in ways we couldn’t have imagined back when the first lockdown started in March. Over that last 7-8 months, we have all come together as a community to learn how to adapt and to cope with the stresses that the virus has put onto our everyday ‘normal’ lives.
As we adjust into the ‘new normal’ (again), and to mark the start of OT Week, I, along with my expert OT team at Julie Jennings and Associates, have reflected on how the Coronavirus pandemic has affected our work, and what we are doing to make sure we continue providing our vital services safely to those who need it most.
Across OT Week we will be highlighting each of the individual roles we undertake, to give a broader picture of life as an OT during the pandemic.
Name: Michelle Eiles
Area of work: My area of expertise is in Adult Social Care
Background experience: Adult social care; community reablement and residential rehabilitation.
Impact of COVID-19 on working practice or your personal perspective
The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted on both my working practice and service delivery, most notably in the decision for my team to work exclusively from home. My role also changed significantly and I was asked to provide support to the local council support hub completing telephone screening to ensure the residents had the support and assistance they required. This role evolved and developed over the initial weeks of the lockdown period and became pivotal to the provision of essential services and the completion of proportionate telephone assessments.
The numbers of residents needing support grew quickly and the additional cases identified by the NHS indicated that there were many vulnerable residents in the local community that were not known to Social Care, many of them with long term health conditions and little or no informal support. As the months progressed and the restrictions were lifted, the support needed by the hub was also reducing. This allowed me to return to my usual role within the team, albeit in a very different way than I had been used to working pre-COVID-19.
The use of technology had been discussed at various times during the initial stages of the COVID-19 pandemic and following input from IT services, it was agreed that the OT team would conduct a pilot using WhatsApp video calling as a way of conducting OT assessments. This would be subject to robust risk assessments and the ability of the individual to participate in this type of assessment and have the required technology to do so. The pilot was successful and now forms part of the proportionate assessments completed by the OTs and Social care workers in the team - there are of course some instances where a WhatsApp assessment is not appropriate and training around the use of PPE has been given to ensure the safety of the team and the vulnerable residents we are visiting.
COVID-19 has brought with it challenges that have altered, and influenced, almost every element of my clinical practice. I have been faced with highly emotive situations on a regular basis, some directly related to COVID-19 and some indirectly, the impact however was always significant. From dealing with urgent referrals requiring home visits due to moving and handling issues; the breakdown of carer support due to ill health or death or the provision of simple kitchen equipment to promote independence and reduce the dependency on a formal support package. Despite the devastating effect of COVID-19 on the local community as a whole, the referrals to Social care remained consistent with the team continuing to deliver a high quality service, even managing to keep waiting list times down to below the national average - a huge achievement from a team that I am very proud to be a part of.
Your OT perspective and what you can do to positive influence challenges imposed by the pandemic
I was involved in the WhatsApp pilot within the OT team and completed a review of the cases completed using this method. The outcomes were shared with the wider Social care service with it being agreed that the use of technology in this way had considerable benefits and it has now been adopted as one of the preferred methods for the completion of proportionate assessments.
The use of WhatsApp has allowed for waiting lists to be reduced and also offers the opportunity for care agencies to be involved in the assessment process through a group video chat, thus eliminating the need for family members to be present - this was particularly useful when family members did not live local and their ability to travel was limited.
Your commitments to support the recovery of people that have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic
As a senior member within the team I am involved with the screening of referrals received into the team. Along with my OT colleagues, we have noticed a significant increase in the number of referrals for rehousing due to substance misuse or domestic abuse. This has been echoed across the country with domestic abuse charities and shelters reporting a huge increase in people accessing their services. This has highlighted that effects of COVID-19 are not only limited to the possible impact on physical health but go much further and can have the potential to be life changing on many different levels.
I aim to continue my training and education around the impact of COVID-19 on substance misuse and domestic abuse and will be creative around the use of technology when completing assessments with those potentially at risk, and will keep up to date with any legislative or policy changes that may influence my practice.