Back to Practice with Covid-19

The end of QMU is in sight. This is the final week of the drive through service at QMU. Over the course of the last few weeks the daily numbers have been between 500 and 800 and we have started to vaccinate with Pfizer alongside AstraZenica. Our staff have often been called to other short-staffed centres in the Lothians, including myself spending a shift at the Lowlands Centre at Ingliston. Over the last few weeks I have hit a personal daily best of 60 vaccines administered in an 8 hour shift and vaccinated a client who stated that they had never had an injection that had not caused them to faint. This client, on seeing my eyes drift down to their considerable array of arm tattoos were quick to point out the irony themselves and claimed, perhaps rightly, that tattoo needles were very different. However a challenge had now been set. Could I vaccinate this client without them keeling over in a dead faint? Well I would certainly have go. Their request was for the left arm so ...

After our initial return to Pfizer we have switched once again to AstraZenica. This has roughly corresponded with when we made the switch in March so that we can continue to provide second doses to the same cohort of people. As we power through May we are now regularly seeing 700 cars each day and delivering first and second doses on a ratio of about 1:5. As a result I have increased my hours for the next month or so from 16 to 24 hours a week. It all feels very well paced, useful and satisfying. We mostly see people in their fifties and upwards coming for their second jag and some younger people for their first. However AstraZenica is not now offered to anyone under 30 and anyone under 40 can choose to have it or opt to be sent elsewhere for an alternative. Quite a few thirtysomethings seem happy enough to opt for the AstraZenica once they have had a chat with a vaccinator. On another, sadder note the drive through service at QMU is ending next month. We will deliver our final ...

I'm told this article is due to appear in the current issue of Community Practitioner ( https://www.communitypractitioner.co.uk/ ). I'm not able to verify this as access to the journal is via membership access. It's based on a few of my earlier blog entries.  

Full on with second doses now. And May is not living up to its springtime billing so far! It has been very cold and wet at times. On my first day administering second jags I noticed that all of the clients were from a particular date in February and that the following day they would correspond with my first shift as a vaccinator. I wondered if I would meet anyone to whom I had given a first jab. The third client tuned out to one such person as indeed did a few others over the course on my second shift. It was very nice to meet up with people a second time. We are now picking up a clearer picture of reactions to first jags and it seems pretty minimal with the Pfizer. Of the many dozen second doses I have now given, the vast majority reported little or no side effects with only a couple reporting feelings of being unwell for a few days. The numbers are also back up to better levels than in April with figures above 500 most days. This certainly helps the shifts to rattle along if y...

Well it has been a little quieter as anticipated. Over the last few of weeks at QMU we have been running at perhaps 40% of capacity on average. We continue to have wee stories, such as the young person outwith our age limit criteria with a special letter of dispensation to receive the vaccine, a client a with rare and unusual anaphylaxis history which, if accurate , meant they could not safely be vaccinated at QMU and occasional walk-in clients very unhappy at being turned away. Also a small number of very anxious recipients who turn out to anxious about everything! W e have this week moved back to Pfizer with some very short expiry stock but have used up all available vials within the time required. I believe that next week will see us beg i n to pivot to focus more on second doses. Since new staff have been recruited to deputise for the clinical lead there has also been less need to cover this role which has meant more time for vaccinating. In the last six shifts I have o...

It’s been a couple of weeks since I last posted and vaccinations are continuing at a steady, if not spectacular pace. We are generally operating at between a thirty to sixty percent capacity most days. My shifts as lead were mostly unremarkable. In the same vein as see one, do one, teach one for vaccine administration, I was shadowed on both shifts by staff who, in their turn, were taking the lead later in the week. In late March we started to contact individuals who we had previously not vaccinated due to their history of allergies or anaphylaxis to reschedule their appointments. Our local policy has reverted closer to our original one where most people, unless they have a very specific anaphylactic history, can be vaccinated at QMU. This change of policy has caused some confusion and even consternation at times with both staff and the public, but we are operating in a fast moving environment where changes will be required from time to time. We are also now getting some c...

Well the pace did pick up albeit a little falteringly at the start of this week. There were some well-publicised issues with appointment letters which meant that Monday morning was eerily quiet while by late afternoon there were waits of up to an hour to get jabbed. Nevertheless everyone was seen and we saw numbers in the 7 and 8 hundreds at the start of the week although that did drop down to the 5 hundreds later in the week. It looks like we should see at least 5000 this week just as we hear the rather disappointing news that supplies are set to diminish over April. It’s a shame, as we are staffed and geared up to deliver some 6 to 7 thousand vaccination per week and throughout April we will presumably only deliver a fraction of that, I would guess with more of a focus on second vaccinations. Staffing wise it should be easy enough to cut back as about half of our staff at capacity are on bank contracts and there will be few bank hours available over April. The atmosphere at the hub...