E-zec PTLO recognised in Shropshire Awards

A Patient Transport Liaison Officer (PTLO) based at the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital is celebrating after being shortlisted in a prestigious regional award which recognises local hospital heroes.

Steve Lovell, PTLO at E-zec Shropshire was nominated for Partner of the Year in the SaTH (Shrewsbury & Telford Hospitals) Trust Awards for his commitment to the industry, and his innovative developments to streamlining a more efficient and effective service.

Andrea Bayes, Renal Manager at E-zec Shropshire, said: “We were incredibly proud to learn that Steve Lovell was nominated in the SaTH Trust Awards, and we’d like to wish him a huge congratulations. He was recognised due to his dedication to improving the Non-Emergency Patient Transport Service (NEPTS) and aiming to make it a positive and seamless process for hospitals and service users.”

Steve previously worked as an Ambulance Care Assistant (ACA) for three years prior to undertaking his new role as PTLO, which he’s had for approximately three and a half years. E-zec took over the Shropshire contract in October 2021, and for the past 12 months, he’s been supporting the business with developing and enhancing NEPTS.

“Earlier this year we launched a new initiative at both the Royal Shrewsbury Hospital (RSH) and the Princess Royal Hospital (PRH), Telford, to enhance the administrative accuracy and team efficiency, along with additional staff training”, Andrea continued. “And Steve was absolutely the driving force behind this brand-new programme – since our initial meetings back in July, he’s shown nothing but positive determination and motivation. While all involved have been integral to the success, it’s without doubt that Steve’s hard work and commitment made it possible.

“This is the first time that any NEPTS provider in Shropshire has been nominated for a SaTH Trust Award, and while it spotlights Steve’s successes and personal development, it also demonstrates some of the fantastic work that E-zec are providing within the community.” 

Individuals in the local area were invited to nominate their hospital heroes as part of the annual SaTH Trust Awards. And for the second year running, readers of the Shropshire Star were asked to identify individuals or collectives that have provided exceptional care and service and exceeded all expectations of their role within the NHS / healthcare setting.

The virtual awards ceremony was held on Thursday 17th November.

Steve added: “It was such an honour to have been recognised in this way, and I’m incredibly grateful for all who nominated me. While I wasn’t crowned the overall winner of this category, I feel incredibly privileged to have had my work commended – and to have been the first from any NEPTS provider is hugely significant, because it really highlights the importance of what we do in the community.”  

ACA Pip Duffy is dubbed King of the Crooners!

A budding singer/songwriter is providing delightful entertainment to the local Ipswich community.

Pip, an Ipswich-based E-zec ACA, often serenades patients on his ambulance, and has become known locally as the ‘King of the Crooners’.

Pip said: “I’ve been with E-zec just over 12 months, and my favourite part of the role is meeting so many new and interesting individuals. I love to chat with them, and with a personal passion for songwriting and performing, I can’t resist treating them to a tune! Not only do I love it, but it always brings a smile to their faces – and if I’m lucky, they join in, too.

“I sing at weddings, private functions, and in local care homes in my spare time – many of which we frequently transport service users to and from, so it’s lovely to see familiar faces in the front row. I’m gaining quite the fanbase.”

Pip’s long-term crewmate, Ray added: “It’s very rare that I don’t hear Pip in the back of the ambulance, singing and laughing. He’s got a fantastic voice, and it really does brighten up the day – for the patients and for us. I’m usually shouting at him for an encore.”

Pip’s Road-Based Supervisor, Carl Cheadle said: “It’s such a delight to learn about Pip’s passion for music, and how he endeavours to go above and beyond to bring joy to our service users. Not only does he give back to the community in his day-to-day role at E-zec, but he performs in local care homes, waiving any fee, instead only covering his expenses.

“We’re very much looking forward to the Christmas karaoke where Pip is performing with our Senior Operations Manager, Kym Young. We’re all patiently waiting – and desperately hoping that it’s not a rendition of Hylda Baker and Arthur Mallard’s, You’re the One that I Want. But, perhaps they’ll be the next big thing… Watch this space.”

Lifetime Achievement Award for E-zec Volunteer Driver

Volunteer Driver wins Lifetime Achievement award

A Suffolk-based volunteer has been presented with a community award after dedicating years of his life to supporting his local town. 

Glenn Barker, aged 70, from Bury was awarded the prestigious Lifetime Achievement accolade at the Bury Free Press Community Awards recently, after being nominated and recognised for his contribution as a Volunteer Car Service (VCS) driver for E-zec in Suffolk.

Glenn said: “I’m still a little overwhelmed after receiving this award – I can’t believe it. I absolutely love what I do, and have been a VCS driver for E-zec since the inception of the Suffolk/Waveney contract back in 2019. Before this, I was a VCS driver for the East of England Ambulance Service for 10 years.

“About 16 years ago, I suffered a cardiac arrest. After a spell in hospital and eight weeks in rehabilitation, my only means of accessibility was through hospital transport. I was so incredibly grateful for this service, which allowed me to remain a sense of independence. So, I made it my mission to return to full health, and become part of this incredible initiative at E-zec”.

The Lifetime Achievement award recognises those who have, over a lifetime, made significant positive contributions to Bury, striving to make it a better place for those within it. Glenn was nominated due to going above and beyond – he’s driven over 900,000 miles, and has been known to personally contact service users the day before transport is arranged to ease anxieties and boost familiarity.

“The most rewarding part of the job is the people that you meet,” Glenn continued. “In my time, I’ve come across some wonderful individuals, and being able to play just a small part of the journey – in what is typically a daunting or scary time of their life – is an absolute pleasure. For example, I’ve taken young adults who’ve had kidney transplants to post-op care, and have tried to relieve some stress and anxiety for service users attending oncology appointments. 

“I’m incredibly humbled – thank you to those who nominated me. And to anyone considering becoming a VCS driver – do it! It truly is the most rewarding job in the world.”

Darron Burns, Regional Manager at E-zec Suffolk added: “On behalf of the entire E-zec team, we’d like to wish Glenn huge congratulations for this fantastic recognition. We’re incredibly lucky to have a wonderful team of VCS drivers on the ground, supporting our communities and playing an integral role in the business”.

Congratulations and very well done Glenn! We truly appreciate you!

Training with Basegreen: First Steps

Last week saw training provider Basegreen visiting E-zec’s Shrewsbury, Shropshire operations to speak to existing Ambulance Care Assistant (ACA) colleagues about their personal and career aspirations. E-zec is completely committed to supporting its people through government-funded development to help them achieve their goals.

ACAs in Shrewsbury have shown a real interest, with the whole base buzzing with how E-zec is delivering on its promise of further development and training.

Of the visit, Basegreen CEO, Mathew Woodhead said: “It’s fabulous to see so many ACAs taking an interest in developing their skills and ultimately their careers.”

Simon Pill, E-zec’s Head of Learning and Development said: “It feels great to deliver on what we promised, which was development for all, and we are just starting this journey. Over the coming days and weeks we will be visiting our Hereford, Worcester and Redruth bases. Early next year, we will visit each of E-zec’s operational hubs to give all our ACAs the opportunity to grow.”

Basegreen paid a visit to E-zec’s Shrewsbury operations to talk about progression within the company

A Very Special Delivery

ACA Josh delivers baby in car park

A newly recruited Ambulance Care Assistant (ACA) was pushed to new limits with an unusual initiation during his first official week working at E-zec.

Having only been out on the road for a matter of days, ACA Joshua Hender was posed with the stressful challenge of assisting a mother in the very final stages of labour – in the hospital car park.

E-zec may provide specialist non-emergency, bariatric, and high-dependency medical transport to patients but now we can add immediate maternity assistance to the list…

Speaking after the eventful shift Josh said: “I was sat with my ambulance partner, Andy, outside Ipswich Hospital waiting for instructions on our next job. Suddenly, a car pulled up in front of us, with a man frantically running out and shouting for help.

“We jumped out of the cab, and once we realised what was happening, Andy and the dad fled into the building to get maternity assistance. I started talking to the mother in labour, helping her to keep calm, but quickly realised that the baby was coming. Now.

“Within a matter of minutes, the baby was in my arms. I wrapped the newborn in a coat and placed her onto the mother’s chest, until the maternity team came to take over. It certainly was a very exciting first Friday shift, and a day I’ll never forget.”

Prior to working at E-zec, Joshua was a semi-professional goalkeeper for Ipswich Town, and so is no stranger to making fast-paced decisions, and making that crucial save – albeit, never before a baby.

Suffolk-based Supervisor Carl Cheadle said: “This is such an incredible story and portrays just what a valuable role our colleagues play in supporting our communities as a whole. We’re extremely proud of Joshua for his quick thinking and supporting the mother during what must have been an incredibly scary time for all.

“He truly immersed himself into the role and has demonstrated what it means to go above and beyond – a crucial part of being an ACA. And, being an ex-semi-professional footballer, mum and baby were certainly both in very safe hands! Well done to all involved, and huge congratulations to the parents, who have informed us they are all doing well.”

Suffolk-based ACA Josh delivered a baby on his third shift for E-zec

E-zec publishes its Quality Account for 2021/2022

Organisations are required under the Health Act 2009 and subsequent Health and Social Care Act 2012 to produce Quality Accounts if they deliver services under an NHS Standard Contract, have staff numbers over 50 and NHS income greater than £130k per annum.

A Quality Account is an annual published report about the quality of services and improvements offered by NHS healthcare providers.

From Mike Woodall, E-zec’s Chief Operating Officer: 

I am pleased to introduce the annual Quality Account for 2021/22. This document is both forward looking and retrospective. It sets out the work we have done over the past year to improve the quality of our care and keep patients safe and provides information on our priorities for 2022/23.

The start of this financial year saw us in the grip of a second wave of COVID with the effects of the Alpha and then subsequently the Omicron variants impacting heavily on our services and on those of our system partners.

COVID-19 has had a very significant impact on the NHS and NHS providers across the country and we have seen how it has stretched services and people to near breaking point. But E -zec Medical’s staff can be proud of how they responded and continue to keep themselves, our service users, and the community safe.

It is a remarkable achievement for this organisation that in a year of so much change and difficulty, our people have continued to improve the services that we provide and have taken great strides forward in delivering a great people, great place strategy.

Our improvement journey, continues at pace and we end this year very much looking forward to a potential visit from the Care Quality Commission (CQC) and the opportunity to demonstrate how far we have come

We have been ensuring that our ‘business as usual’ functions maintained the quality and safety of our services, while striving to provide the best possible response to our patients. Some of our key achievements during 2021/22 have been:

• Our continued focus on staff and service user safety

• Delivery of quality assurance work aligned to our CQC ratings

• Achieving our Right Care strategy goals

• The development of a new quality strategy using feedback from both service users and staff

• Maintenance of staff safety (RIDDOR reports) and we are proud of the extensive work we have done to protect our staff from Covid-19 workplace transition

We continue to receive positive feedback on the improvements that we are making and look forward to what we can achieve in the coming year on behalf of the people who use our services. 

Quality-Account-21-22-PPT-v2-2.pdfDownload

E-zec’s ongoing court case with HMRC: the latest

E-zec ambulance

“The team here at E-zec has recently received some positive news in an ongoing case against HMRC, and whilst it’s not yet all set in stone we did want to share an update. Along with other PTS providers, we’ve been challenging HMRC on an element of VAT law and how they classify some of the vehicles used across the patient transport sector. The case was finally heard and considered, and the Judge agreed with us that the current interpretation wasn’t right, and was causing real inconsistency across the board. His judgement gave clarity for the whole industry moving forwards. 

HMRC have the right to appeal but if the original decision remains unchanged we do see this as a milestone for the sector. The suggested new VAT rules would allow us, and all others who transport patients in the same way, to operate to the same rules as others in allied industries. Importantly, it will also remove a key business risk that we’ve have had to invest significant time and resource to manage. This resource will now be freed up to further support our people, our clients and their patients. 

We’ll know whether HMRC intends to appeal later in October and we’ll be in touch again then to let you know. For now though, we’re pleased to have taken a stand for what we believe was right, and – hopefully – for a more level playing field moving forwards.”

Rob Harvey, Chief Financial Officer

Benefits, wellbeing and engagement platform launches

The end of August saw the launch of E-zec’s new benefits, wellbeing and engagement platform, which all of its employees could use and benefit from, with immediate effect.

Available as an app that can be downloaded from the app store for android and Apple devices, online and nestled in E-zec’s colleague portal ‘My E-zec’, the innovative tool provides a number of benefits, including:

Shopping discounts including most of the main supermarkets for grocery shopping through to money-off purchases of home furnishing, clothes, restaurants, short breaks and a variety of luxury goods

Round-the-clock online GP consultation including a private prescription service.

Access to various Cash Plan Services that can provide colleagues and their families with peace of mind if they become unexpectedly ill or if the very worst happens.

An Employee Assistance Programme providing counselling support 24/7, 365 days a year, including a confidential helpline for medical, legal and financial matters as well as access to an online library of self-help tools and webinars to help support physical and mental health and wellbeing.

An ambulance care assistant based (ACA) in Bristol has already benefitted from the online GP service saying:

“I had suddenly developed an infection that if it had developed further would have meant me taking time off work over a weekend shift. I called the GP service, secured a video call appointment with a lovely GP who prescribed antibiotics, which I collected from my local pharmacy before starting when the next morning. No way would it have been so straight forward at my normal GP surgery – I wouldn’t have had an appointment until the Monday and even then would have had to hold for an appointment at 8.30 in the morning, having suffered with symptoms all weekend.”

Similarly, a colleague based in Somerset secured a huge discount on new carpets for his home, using the 8% discount on offer at Carpetright.

Using a combination of discounts from E-zec’s app and Blue Light Card, others have saved 14% on their weekly shop at Asda.

E-zec’s new platform can be used in conjunction with existing retailer-specific discount and voucher schemes as well as Blue Light Card savings and promotions.

Of the platform’s launch, E-zec’s Chief People Officer Justine Vaughan said: “We are delighted to have recently launched our new and very exciting Benefits and Rewards based platform for all E-zec colleagues.  

Recognising our ‘People First’ company value means that we truly believe that our colleagues should come first by providing access to a variety of Wellbeing, Engagement and Discounted benefits and it has been very positively received internally. In addition to the benefits our colleagues have already started to enjoy, our focus on colleague wellbeing is now being further supported by providing access to immediate 24 hr, seven-day access to GP support, enabling colleagues to access medical assistance when they need it and when it’s convenient for them. This a huge benefit and unique in the workplace. We have already started to see an uptake in other benefits we provide through this platform, providing ‘peace of mind’ when it comes to absence in the workplace or the need to receive hospital treatment – through these aspects of the platform, and if they chose to take up these benefits, our colleagues continue to receive an income if they are too unwell to work or have an important medical appointment. 

The great opportunity here and one of the reasons why working at E-zec is so rewarding is that our colleagues have a choice of benefits they can access… We recognise that what’s important to one may be different to another – flexibility is key and that’s the aim of our Reward and Benefits Strategy, which we will continue to develop moving forward.”   

Shropshire’s operations rated ‘Good’ by the CQC

Shrewsbury dispatch centre

The Care Quality Commission (CQC) is the independent regulator of health and social care in England. Following an unannounced, comprehensive inspection by the CQC in May, E-zec is delighted to report that the CQC has rated its Shropshire operations as ‘Good’.

During the CQC’s inspection, they spoke to 14 E-zec colleagues, including ambulance care assistants, control room colleagues, supervisors and managers. The inspection team checked eight vehicles, reviewed five patient records and six colleague records, primarily at the company’s Shrewsbury dispatch centre.

The CQC’s inspection covers five key lines of enquiry that they ask of all care services that they inspect. These are: Safe, Effective, Caring, Responsive to People’s Needs and Well Led.

Highlights from the CQC’s inspection include:

• The service had mostly enough staff to care for patients and keep them safe. Staff had training in key skills, understood how to protect patients from abuse, and managed safety well. Staff assessed risks to patients, acted on them and kept good care records. The service managed safety incidents well and learned lessons from them. Staff collected safety information and used it to improve the service.

• Managers monitored the effectiveness of the service and made sure staff were competent. Staff worked well together for the benefit of patients and had access to good information. Key services were available seven days a week.

• Staff treated patients with compassion and kindness, respected their privacy and dignity, took account of their individual needs, and helped them understand their conditions. Staff told us they provided emotional support to patients, families and carers.

• The service planned care to meet the needs of local people, took account of patients’ individual needs, and made it easy for people to give feedback.

• Leaders ran services well using reliable information systems and supported staff to develop their skills. Most staff felt respected, supported and valued. They were focused on the needs of patients receiving care. Staff were clear about their roles and accountabilities. The service engaged well with patients and the community to plan and manage services and all staff were committed to improving services continually.

E-zec’s CEO Craig Smith was keen to align the Shropshire report with recent local quality inspections at E-zec’s operations in Dorset and Ipswich, saying: “As a business being ‘Committed to Care’ and ‘Listening, Learning, Adapting’ are two of our core values and underpin the way we behave and act. Following some developmental feedback from the CQC in last year’s Suffolk inspection, we have had a real focus on our quality strategy. It is really pleasing to see the progress made, which has now been recognised externally by two ICB quality leads and now the CQC. Of course there is always a lot more for us to do and we will continue to ensure quality remains an absolute priority for us with clear action plans to track progress.”

The CQC’s full report can be found here:

https://www.cqc.org.uk/location/1-11654148478

About E-zec Shropshire:

E-zec Shropshire’s contract is to provide 95,000 patient journeys for children and adults each year across Shropshire and Powys. The types of journeys patients undertake includes: renal dialysis, outpatients appointments, discharges, admissions, transfers, oncology, palliative care, paediatric transport, bariatric transport, and GP transfers. In addition to standard patient transport services, E-zec provides a dedicated renal manager to provide enhanced support for dialysis patients across the region, a shuttle service linking the two acute NHS hospitals in Shropshire, plus a support service to facilitate the discharge of long-stay patients and their equipment.

Shrewsbury, Shropshire – E-zec’s flagship operational hub, rated GOOD by the CQC

Shaping E-zec’s fleet of the future with Venari

E-zec Medical fleet and ambulance crews visit Venari

As part of its vision for the future, which involves fully harnessing the skills, enthusiasm and passion of all of its colleagues, in July 2022 E-zec assembled a group of volunteers from across the business including colleagues from fleet, ambulance care assistants and key stakeholders. This Vehicle Specification Steering Group‘s first stop was a visit to Venari in Goole to consult with them about the development and build of E-zec’s new ambulances. The meeting included a tour of the factory and production line to help the team to understand the process of converting a base light commercial vehicle into an ambulance. Patient transport equipment and resource specialist Ferno also attended and ran a demonstration session of all the various equipment that they currently have available.

The result of the meeting and all the great ideas, comments and feedback given by the group, was that Venari are working with E-zec’s fleet team, lead by Mark Vardon, to develop an industry-leading ambulance for the future.

Head of Fleet Mark Vardon said after the steering group’s visit: “We Listen, We Learn, We Adapt! This was a great opportunity for our road-based colleagues to voice their opinion on our plans for the E-zec fleet of the future. I would like to thank all of the steering group for their time and invaluable input. I would also like to thank Oliver North – CEO at Venari – and his team for their hospitality and making the E-zec team feel so welcome on the day. Also thanks to Trust Ford, Ford Fleet Management and Ferno for their support.”