Lancashire Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust has launched its annual flu fighter campaign in order to protect staff, patients, colleagues and loved ones from the virus.
The annual flu fighter campaign commenced on Monday 10th September and has already seen 3,488 staff get their flu jabs – making a total of 42.5% of frontline staff being vaccinated.
Lancashire Teaching Hospitals has introduced dedicated flu nurses who are visiting wards and departments to offer the jab, as well as offering flu clinics which are taking place throughout the winter period.
Last week, staff also got involved with the national #jabathon campaign; a social media campaign aimed at getting NHS staff to share their reasons for getting the flu jab and to encourage others to get theirs. A target was set to increase uptake of flu jabs within this week by 500 – and the team smashed this target with over 800 staff being vaccinated during this period.
This year, Lancashire Teaching Hospitals are running a ‘Give A Jab, Get A Jab’ campaign whereby for every flu jab given, the hospitals will donate the cost of one tetanus vaccine to UNICEF to help them keep children safe. The campaign has already been hugely well received and aims to ensure that staff are getting their flu jabs, whilst helping a fantastic cause.
Every year, the influenza vaccination is offered to frontline healthcare workers in the NHS as a way to reduce the risk of staff contracting the virus and transmitting it to their patients and service users. Without any knowledge of it happening, you could pass on the flu virus and potentially cause severe complications or even death.
Rachel O’Brien, Workforce Strategic Business Partner at Lancashire Teaching Hospitals, said: “More than 75% of our staff at Royal Preston Hospital and Chorley Hospital were vaccinated against the flu last year, enabling us to achieve the national target and protect our patients, staff and loved ones from the virus. We are pleased with how the campaign is going so far and hope that we can get even more staff to be vaccinated against the flu this year.”
Karen Swindley, Workforce and Education Director at Lancashire Teaching Hospitals, said: “We were delighted to have reached our flu target last year, and are hopeful that even more staff will get the flu vaccine this year. The flu virus can make people extremely poorly and we are committed to ensuring our patients are protected as much as possible while they are in our hospitals.”