The Fatigue Working Group was unfortunately put on hold due to the Omicron outbreak but we have recently resumed meetings and the next part of the project will be to send a snapshot survey to all those working in health, with the aim of establishing a baseline understanding of our fatigue challenges, the system drivers and how staff feel. The working group is hoping to achieve ethics approval this month so that the survey can be sent in May 2022. The survey aims to cover all workforces, not just frontline workers and the work being undertaken alongside the other healthcare unions, DHBs, TAS and the Massey Sleep/Wake Clinic experts.
The group working on the Senior Registrar Project has also resumed meetings and are currently working on a document which aims to provide practical advice and guidance to those RMOs who are responsible for writing and managing rosters. All too often we see RMOs being asked to do this job with no proper handover or support, so we are hoping to change this with the work being undertaken by this group.
We are pleased to advise that the work undertaken by the Psychiatry Project Group to develop best practice guidelines for home-based assessments after-hours has now been included, and is officially part of the STONZ MECA. You can find these under Appendix 7 of the MECA and we hope to see these provisions start to become custom and practice across all DHBs and services throughout Aotearoa.