the exceptional
achievements of unsung heroes
within health and social care
services in Scotland
for nominating
Finalists will be revealed soon
Finalists will be revealed soon
PEOPLE'S CHOICE AWARD WINNER BELOW
VOTING CLOSES 8TH OCTOBER 2021
VOTING CLOSES 8TH OCTOBER 2021
People's Choice Award
SPONSORED BY
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The People’s Choice Award sponsored by Alpha Solway recognises the extraordinary work of NHS Scotland staff, social care staff and carers in responding to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic.
We now have our 6 finalists and it’s over to you to vote for the winner(s). The winner(s) will be announced at the Scottish Health Awards ceremony on Thursday 4th November.
Read through the amazing finalist stories below then select who you think should win the People’s Choice Award 2021.
There is no limit on how many votes you can make.
VOTING CLOSES 8TH OCTOBER 2021, 5PM!
Forth Valley Primary Care Multi-Disciplinary Team
NHS Forth Valley
When the pandemic began, care home residents were badly affected by the Covid-19 virus, suffering severely distressing symptoms and many deaths.
The crisis needed a swift response from the various care and health providers to give medicines to people with the virus in 66 care homes within the area and supporting more than 2,000 residents.
Doctors, nurses, pharmacists, care home managers, clinicians, educators and palliative care services were among those who teamed up to set up a system to rapidly supply medicines. Transport and communication hubs were also set up.
A mechanism to quickly alleviate distressing Covid-19 symptoms had to be found, but this was a real challenge because of the rapidity of decline and because care homes are not allowed to stock controlled drugs.
A potential medication shortage meant that a ‘just in case’ supply for at risk residents was not an option. Care home staff were also unfamiliar with assessing and managing patients with Covid-19.
The whole process was set up within 72 hours and lasted 15 months, only recently being withdrawn because most residents had been given the opportunity to be double-vaccinated.
Homeless Health and Asylum Service
Glasgow City Health and Social Care Partnership
This team provides health and social care assessment and treatment to some of the most vulnerable and complex patient groups in Glasgow.
At the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, the service changed its model of delivery away from clinics to outreach and more face-to-face contact.
Every element of the service was reviewed in response to the rising numbers of homeless people and asylum seekers in the city. During the pandemic, Glasgow accomodated over 600 newly homeless people in hotels while deadling with ongoing pressures in finding homes for asylum seekers.
The team worked tirelessly to provide the best possible patient care, helping to save lives.
An outreach service for young people was set up and the women’s service was moved to a new female only base in the city centre. New clinics were set up to offer wound care and addiction treatment.
Flu jabs and Naloxone – a medicine that reverses an opioid overdose – were delivered as well as a Covid-19 vaccination programme that includes a clinic for all new asylum seekers.
Home-Start North Lanarkshire
NHS Lanarkshire
This group supports thousands of families on low income, those struggling with mental health, maternity mental health, and isolation, and those with additional needs.
During the pandemic, the team could no longer carry out home visits and instead contacted people every week on WhatsApp, Zoom, and by email, text and telephone.
When restrictions were lifted, they visited families door to door, providing a friendly face and much needed items such as books and play packs for children, sanitary items for women, shaving items for men, and Christmas gifts.
Homestart helps parents and carers give their children a better start in life. Services include parent-to-parent supporters, one-to-one support for perinatal mental health problems, breastfeeding support groups, getting children outdoors, tackling the attainment gap with schools, bringing lonely parents together, and getting dads involved in antenatal workshops. They also help families struggling to fill in forms to access food and clothing grants.
Lisa Watt, Primary Care Manager
Shetland Health and Social Care Partnership
Lisa has been working tirelessly during the pandemic, putting her patients first and goes the extra mile to help them and staff.
She quietly and diligently works away in the background, making sure that patients in Shetland receive an excellent service.
During the Covid-19 vaccination programme, Lisa was the primary care contact in Shetland, which didn’t use the national scheduling system. Instead, local systems were set up to identify and call eligible patients.
Lisa also carried on with her usual duties, providing management and support to ten GP practices across the islands.
The pandemic response in remote and rural areas – accessible only by plane or ferry and often cut off by bad weather – required a high level of inter-departmental co-operation and co-ordination to vaccinate patients as quickly and efficiently as possible.
The Shetland vaccination programme has been very successful. Lisa has continued to make herself available to patients and staff with queries regarding both the vaccination programme and Covid-19 guidance.
NHS Fife Community Listening Service Volunteers
NHS Fife
Community Chaplaincy Listening is a national therapeutic listening service offered in 20 Fife GP surgeries to patients who need emotional and spiritual support.
The team of 21 volunteers also listen to cancer patients referred to them by Macmillan Cancer Support.
During the pandemic, when they could no longer carry out face-to-face work in surgeries, they offered a telephone listening service to vulnerable patients who needed someone to talk to as they dealt with health issues and isolation.
It has also been a lonely time for cancer patients as the usual support services in the community have not been available. The telephone support service has been a great help to them.
Each volunteer offers two or three hours per week. Over the last 18 months they have made around 2,500 phone calls of up to 45 minutes each, listening to stories of suffering while working from home and struggling with their own isolation during the pandemic.
Despite the demands on their own emotional health and wellbeing, the volunteers continued to offer the service with empathy and skill, encouraging those in need.
Scottish Ambulance Service
The Service’s Covid mobile testing unit operational delivery team have been nominated for their outstanding work on the frontline of the pandemic.
The Service overcame significant geographical challenges to provide Covid testing throughout Scotland, even in remote and rural areas, and supported the outbreak management and community testing that played such a crucial role in Test and Protect.
The unit has gone above and beyond to deploy mobile testing units quickly to respond to outbreaks and community need, more than doubling the number of units from 18 to 42 since taking over mobile testing from the Armed Forces in August last year.
The unit ensures patients in urban, rural and remote areas have easy access to coronavirus testing. The service complements the drive-through testing centres and testing carried out in hospitals and care homes.
The programme greatly improved the accessibility of testing, especially for those who find travel challenging, such as older people and those with mobility problems.
The operation now has the capacity to deliver more than 25,000 tests per day, playing a significant role in the ongoing response to the Covid-19 pandemic.
Scottish Health Awards
The Scottish Health Awards are the most prestigious and recognised awards for those working across NHS Scotland and its partners to deliver high quality health and social care services to the people of Scotland. Run by the Daily Record in partnership with NHS Scotland and the Scottish Government, the awards are now well established in the Scottish calendar and recognise those that go that extra mile to improve the health and wellbeing of others.
Since March 2020, NHS Scotland and its partners across health and social care have risen to the challenge of dealing with the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. The NHS was put on an emergency footing – maintaining urgent care, flexing capacity from paused services to meet demand and developing innovative ways of working.
Those working across health and social care have shown incredible resolve and flexibility, in many cases being deployed into new roles and into new ways of working across our health and social care system.
Please take the time to nominate someone you believe deserves to be recognised across the sixteen award categories for this year. Nominations close on 26 August 2021
While we expect that the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic will again feature across the majority of the award categories, the People’s Choice Award specifically recognises our individuals and teams who have responded so magnificently to the challenge of caring for people during the pandemic, while at the same time maintaining a range of essential services and continuing to provide essential care.
The People’s Choice Award will be put to a public vote after nominations close on 26 August and when our judging panel have selected the most inspiring nominations, you’ll be able to vote for your winner in this category.
We’ll announce the finalists in the other categories on 4 October and all winners – including the winner of the People’s Choice Award – will be announced on 4 November at the awards ceremony - we'll announce details of how you can join us nearer the time.
The sixteen award categories are:
• Support Worker Award
• Innovation Award
• Volunteers Award
• Midwife Award
• Allied Health Professional Award
• Young Achiever Award
• Unsung Hero Award
• Care for Mental Health Award
• Integrated Care Award
• Tackling Health Inequalities Award
• Leader of the Year Award
• Nurse Award
• Doctor Award
• Top Team Award
• Global Citizenship Award
• People’s Choice Award
Awards Ceremony
Thursday 4 November
Award Categories
Nominations have now closed. Thank you to all who nominated
How It Works
Nomination Process
Anyone can make a nomination for the Scottish Health Awards and we particularly welcome nominations from the general public who wish to nominate and recognise the contribution and achievements of:
- individuals, groups and teams delivering NHS or integrated health and social care services within an NHS, Health and Social Care Partnerships or a Local Authority environment; and
- individuals, groups and teams from partner organisations, charities or external organisations who provide health and social care services.
An individual, a group or a team can be nominated for a maximum of two award categories as long as each nomination satisfies the specific award criteria in each. The event organisers reserve the right to reassign nominations to a category that they believe most suited to the nomination.
Please note that individuals cannot nominate themselves but a nomination for a group or a team from an individual within that team will be accepted.
When making a nomination, please ensure that the person or people you are nominating are aware of your nomination and have agreed to you providing information about their work as well as their contact details. This is because the information you provide in the nomination form may be used as a basis for a written feature within Reach plc newspapers without Reach plc making contact with the person nominated to gain their consent. On that basis, we cannot accept nominations where the person being nominated hasn’t given agreement for you to share information about their work.
Your nomination should contain the following information:
- Why you want to nominate this individual/team?
- What were they trying to achieve?
- What did they do?
- What happened as a result?
Nominations can be made for individuals, groups or teams working in an NHS environment, Health and Social Care Partnerships or in a Local Authority environment delivering integrated health and social care services. Some award categories are open to partner organisations and to individuals from external organisations. Please read the award category descriptors carefully to decide the category most appropriate for the person or people you wish to nominate.
Nominations open on Tuesday 22 June and close at 5:00pm on Thursday 26 August. Nominations received after this time will not be accepted.
Profiles and photographs of the winners will be published on the Scottish Health Awards website.
The winners of the Scottish Health Awards will be announced at the awards ceremony on Thursday 4 November 2021
Judging Process
All completed nomination forms will be reviewed by a shortlisting panel who will select the top six scoring nominations in each award category to proceed to the next stage.
Shortlisted nominations will be reviewed by a judging panel which comprises a number of senior NHS Scotland and Health and Social Care Integration representatives, Scottish Government Health and Social Care Policy Officials and a representative from the Daily Record.
Each judge scores the shortlisted nominations separately and then the judging panel comes together to agree the three finalists (which will comprise the winner and two runners up) from each award category.
Where there is a tie break, the Chair of the Judging panel will have the casting vote.
All three finalists will be invited to attend the Awards Ceremony.
This year, we want to take the opportunity again to recognise the extraordinary work of NHS Scotland staff, social care staff and carers in responding to the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, through the People’s Choice Award. You, the public will have the chance to vote for the winner. Voting for this award will open w.c 13 September 2021.
We will make contact with all of the people who have got through the first stage of the judging process (shortlisted nominations). At that point, we will be seeking agreement that, should they be successful in getting through to the Finalist stage, we have their permission to publish their name in the newspaper.
Voting for this award will open w.c 13 September. All other Awards finalists will be announced w.c 4 October 2021.
Award winners will be announced at the Scottish Health Awards Ceremony on Thursday 4 November 2021.
Frequently Asked Questions
A person can be nominated for up to two category awards as long as each nomination satisfies the specific award criteria in that category. The event organisers reserve the right to reassign nominations to a category they believe is most suited to the nomination.
The judges’ decision will be based on the content of the nomination and what the person or team has done rather than the number of nominations that person or team has received. Multiple nominations do not carry any more weight and will not contribute to the judging outcome.
We may need to contact you and the person you are nominating to seek further information in order to progress your entry. Please provide accurate email addresses and mobile telephone numbers for this purpose and respond as quickly as you can if contacted.
We will make contact with all of the people nominated who have got through the first stage of the judging process. At that point, we will be seeking their agreement that, should they be successful in getting through to the Finalist stage, they give their permission for their name to be published in the newspaper.
Sponsorship
To discuss bespoke sponsorship packages, created to suit your specific objectives and budget please contact:
Marcia Mitchell, marcia.mitchell@reachplc.com / 07790 591 221
Mark Russell, mark.russell@reachplc.com
Debbie Caldwell, debbie.caldwell@reachplc.com / 07789 778263
Megan Waugh, megan.waugh@reachplc.com / 07552 860284
