What do a rogue wasp, a petrol driven hedge trimmer and a dozen pythons have in common?

Answer – they all tried but failed to disrupt the first ‘Fast-Track’ carer awareness training session held at Hillfoot Primary Care Practice in Pudsey on 25th May 2017.

The training was arranged by Alison Stewart, the Practice Business Manager at Hillfoot which is in a group of five Pudsey based practices who have agreed identifying and supporting carers is a priority and have signed-up to the Leeds Commitment to Carers.  Between them the practices have agreed to build on work they have already been doing to further improve identification and recording of carers and to support staff to be ‘carer-aware’.

The idea behind fast-track training is to support staff to improve their awareness of who carers are, what they do and how caring impacts on their health and wellbeing.  It can then be tailored to a particular team – at Hillfoot we focussed on ways of identifying carers in primary care and simple things you can do when you have identified a carer, including how to refer carers to Carers Leeds.

Why fast-track – we recognise that time is precious and so the aim is to deliver the session in between 30 and 45 minutes and to make sure that it’s as interactive as possible.

The staff team at Hillfoot were an absolute delight and really bought into the session.  Alison told us they were reflecting on it the following morning which is usually a sign of a good session!

The rogue wasp buzzed around for most of the time causing the alarm that wasps usually cause.

The hedge trimmer was being used to trim a hedge just outside the room we were using meaning that we had to close the windows on the hottest day of the year so far and in doing so close off an exit route for the wasp.

And the pythons – well yet to be substantiated but someone had heard a rumour that a dozen pythons were on the loose.  Relax – google doesn’t know anything about it!

And we still managed to keep to the 45 minutes.  Well done Hillfoot and keep up the good work!

Ian Brooke-Mawson

Strategic Commissioning Manager (Carers)

Leeds City Council (Adult Social Care) & NHS Leeds Clinical Commissioning Groups