Dear colleagues,

I’m sure you’ve all heard the great news – Queensland recorded 0 new positive COVID-19 cases in the last 24 hours! Even with 10,000 people having been tested across the state. Another milestone reached in Queensland today is that our one millionth COVID-19 was conducted. A great day to be a Queenslander!

Today is RUOK? Day, if you didn’t have the chance to tune into the RUOK? Day Vidcast with Shaun Drummond and Bruce Sullivan you can watch the recording online. Remember, we should be asking anyone who we think might be struggling, if they’re ok every day. If you need some advice on how to cut through the initial ‘I’m OK’ response, have a look at Bruce Sullivan’s How to have a Meaningful RUOK? Conversation.

Further updates today are:

• Concierge kindness
• Interstate Patients and their support person
• Opportunities for MN EOC positions

Concierge kindness

We always get so many compliments about how kind and helpful our concierge volunteers are across all facilities. I’d just like to thank everyone that volunteers their work (and personal) hours to welcoming and screening our patients and their support person or approved visitors. Your work is truly invaluable!

We also have our staff entrances manned with staff volunteers to hand out hand sanitiser, masks and to remind staff to swipe in on entry. Thank you for volunteering your time to do this and please remember to be kind, respectful and use words constructively to get your message across and guide staff to where they should be entering and exiting. Kindness is so important always, but especially in the current world. You and your time are so appreciated!

Interstate Patients and their support person

Some of our interstate patients who attend our facilities for outpatients or day procedure appointments bring their valuable support persons who may not also be family. It’s important to remember they have done the right thing and sought exemptions from the Chief Health Officer to be at our facilities for their care. They will have driven for quite some time and it is important that as a health service we are treating their support people with kindness and compassion allowing them access to amenities such as toilets. If you’re unsure, please contact your local EOC who will be able to provide further clarification on this.

EOC Opportunities

We are remodelling our MNHHS pandemic incident management model to be more sustainable for the duration of the pandemic.  We are establishing sustainable teams for the Emergency Operations Centre at Herston and are seeking applicants for various roles.  The role descriptions include Planning, Duty Manager, Room Manager, Intelligence and Operations and are available on the Metro North EOI portal. I hope you will consider sending in an application if you would like to contribute. We will start the selection process from Monday so early applications would be appreciated.

Continuing Alanna’s tradition of inspiring you all with a daily quote, here’s a favourite of mine by Marcus Aurelius, ‘You’re better off not giving the small things more time than they deserve’. A stoic and philosophical approach to not sweating the small things in life!

Remember to ask your loved ones and colleagues if they’re ok today and always. Dig deep, your conversation could unknowingly save a life.

Kind regards,
Mark Butterworth
Metro North Incident Commander

Metro North HHS – Overview of Cases*

*With effect 10 September 2020, 1000

**Metro North has three recorded deaths (one person a return traveller into NSW, who passed away in NSW)

*** These numbers reflect the cases being managed by Metro North.