Bringing hope to care homes
Royal Borough: Mass COVID-19 vaccinations have begun
Teams of GPs, nurses and paramedics have been working hard for the last few weeks vaccinating the Royal Borough’s care home residents.
Dr Adrian Hayter is part of Primary Care Network, a group of practices in the borough which have joined forces to get the vaccine out to patients.
The Primary Care Network has a Maidenhead, Windsor and Ascot cluster which involves roving teams going out and vaccinating care homes.
Dr Hayter, who has been part of the team vaccinating Windsor care homes, said the task has involved weeks of planning and logistical challenges such as keeping the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine at low temperatures.
He said: “We started the week before Christmas, we are vaccinating larger care homes with over 50 beds.
The vaccine comes in 975 doses which has to be used in three and a half days, we had one packed down into 75 doses, which is enough to vaccinate 50 residents and staff.
“It’s not just about turning up, you have to do a lot of prep work with the manager and staff, get consent forms and make sure people are happy and understand it.
“We had two roving teams of vaccinators with four to six people going and doing the vaccination, a care home of that size takes about four to six hours and the staff are incredibly welcoming.
“The residents were fantastic and there is a real atmosphere of hope for the home.”
Dr Hayter said when the teams enter you can see ‘morale lifting’ in the home, and residents can see the ‘light at the end of the tunnel’.
He also praised members of the vaccinating team who had been called up at a moments notice after others were told to self isolate including retired GP Dr Jenny Langdon from Holyport.
“She’s our number one vaccinator,” he added and said they worked until 8pm at night to make sure the care homes were done.
The team hope to have all Royal Borough care home residents vaccinated with their first dose by the end of the month.
The teams will vaccinate smaller care homes when it receives the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine later this week due to it being easier to transport and store.