Public Health England have created a very useful poster to help provide straightforward guidance on outbreaks of flu in care homes, including; when does it become classed as an outbreak, what to do when an outbreak occurs, and infection prevention control measures to help avoid an outbreak.
Please see below for the poster, which you can download by using the ‘download’ button on the leaflet.
[pdf-embedder url=”https://www.hcpa.info/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Flu_outbreaks_in_carehomes_posterA3.pdf”]
FREE Flu Vouchers available for your staff
We know from previous years that outbreaks of the flu can have a devastating impact on health and social care services. In some cases this has resulted in the temporary closure of care homes and higher than average levels of sickness absence. This impacts both residential and homecare services. HCPA, Hertfordshire County Council and the NHS are working together to build resilience across the health and social care sector.
Therefore, we now have FREE flu vouchers available for your staff as we will pay for them on your behalf. We highly recommend utilising this opportunity to limit the outbreak of flu among your staff and reduce the risk of it spreading to service users.
To obtain flu vouchers:
- Please work out how many members of staff require the vouchers (note: some may be eligible for free vaccinations already).
- Fill in the form here
When you have received your flu vouchers, you will need to:
- Find your nearest participating pharmacy that will accept the vouchers. You can check a list of suitable pharmacies easily here
- Encourage and ensure that your staff use the vouchers – a leaflet is available here
- Please return any unused vouchers to HCPA to ensure we can forward them to someone who will make use of them. The address is: Flu Voucher Return, Attimore Barn, Ridgeway, Welwyn Garden City, Hertfordshire, AL7 2AD