‘Biggest challenge’ for COVID-era Trust is PPE

Neil Guckian, WHSCT Director of Finance, said there had been a huge hike in demand for personal protection equipment.

“Our usage actually went up by over 2,000%. Linked to that is that internationally prices actually went up by over 1,000% over a three week period,” he said.

The finance chief said 12 weeks of PPE stock was swallowed up in one day at he height of the peak period.

“Working with our regional supply service we’ve done some fantastic local procurements. You will be aware of the O’Neills work on scrubs and Bloc Blinds in Magherafelt have resolved the regional demand for visors so we have been able to do that,” he added.

The Trust has also had access to ‘big regional procurements’ and a pandemic store in Belfast. It has, however, not been immune to a worldwide shortage of fluid repellant material which has made sterile gowns difficult to procure.

Mr. Guckian said the Trust had worked with independent care home providers to ensure they had adequate PPE stocks.

“We’ve been able to meet all requests for PPE. Once or twice over the past month we would have aspired to giving out seven days’ stock for all our providers for handiness more than anything. We’ve sometimes had to split that into three days’ stock and four days’ stock simply to be able to get the supplies in on time,” he said.

Geraldine McKay, Director of Acute Services, said PPE is one area where there will be no return to the status quo ante as services are reset.

“The biggest challenge for us going forward is how we use PPE in the future. Services will not ever be the way they were in the past. We are in this pandemic. We are still moving forward in terms of planning: how we run outpatients with PPE; how many patients can sit in an outpatient department,” she said.