Local News
East Anglian Air Ambulance (EAAA) help Covid-19
effort by redeploying Aftercare team of nurses As the call went out for nurses to help during the pandemic, EAAA’s Aftercare Team responded wholeheartedly. Made up of four nurses, Aftercare supports EAAA patients throughout their recovery and updates the EAAA crews on patient outcomes. Before Aftercare was set up, the EAAA teams didn’t always know what happened to their patients. Now, they not only get to know, and sometimes meet, their patients, but this aids continuous learning and improvement. Aftercare also supports bereaved family members. The Aftercare team is headed up by Alison Brett, who leads three nurses who work for EAAA while juggling part-time nursing jobs. Georgie Sellick, Lisa Boyle and Sue Gee support Alison as clinical liaison officers in the respective areas where they are based in the region. Aftercare during the peak of the pandemic Georgie and Lisa both have extensive critical care nursing skills and both returned to work full time in the NHS early on. Alison was asked by the London Air Ambulance to help set up a Family Support and Liaison team at the London Nightingale Hospital. It was important that EAAA Aftercare kept going, so while Alison was in London, Sue continued to balance her hospital work with her EAAA days. Looking back, Alison said: “It’s been a complete whirlwind. While the Aftercare didn’t stop, we are all hugely grateful to EAAA for allowing us to adjust our roles temporarily to help support the NHS. I
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was hugely surprised to be called down to London, but wanted to do as much as I could. Fortunately, there weren’t as many patients at the Nightingale as anticipated and after six weeks, I wasn’t needed anymore. But it could have been a very different story. As nurses, we all felt the urge to support the NHS as much as possible but also have a commitment to EAAA.” EAAA Aftercare moving forward Alison continued: “Our crews were quieter at the beginning of lockdown but now they are busy again, and so are we. There are lots of patients who need our support. However, we are still adapting to new ways of working. We are unable to attend home visits or arrange base visits for patients and their families to meet the crew who attended to them, but it is vitally important that we’re still able to support our patients via video, phone or email. “We help patients to understand what happened, the care and treatment they received and to support them in their recovery, as best we can. We’re really luckily at EAAA to be able to provide this service and I’m immensely proud of the way the team has also been able to help during the Covid-19 pandemic, too.” To learn more about the EAAA Aftercare Service, go to: www.eaaa.org.uk/aftercare To get in touch if you have been helped by EAAA, call: 07495548110 or email aftercare@eaaa.org.uk
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