Pioneering vaccination programme enables nursing home nurses to vaccinate residents

NHS Lancashire and South Cumbria Integrated Care Board is the first in the UK to enable nursing home staff to deliver vaccinations to their own residents.

The innovative vaccination programme was designed and trialled during the COVID-19 pandemic and involved nursing home nurses delivering COVID-19 and flu vaccinations to care home residents and other members of staff in Barrow-in-Furness. Since the pilot, which was held at homes run by the Risedale Nursing Homes group, the programme has now been rolled out across the whole of Lancashire and South Cumbria using an opt-in approach.

Building on learning from the COVID-19 vaccination programme, the model enables trained nursing home nurses to deliver vaccinations directly to residents and staff. This new way of working has improved timeliness of vaccination, enhanced patient experience, increased workforce capability and freed up primary care capacity.

It is now getting national attention with other ICB areas keen to adapt this model of work.

Carole McCann, programme director and clinical lead for the Lancashire and South Cumbria ICB vaccination programme, said: “Care home residents are among the most clinically vulnerable members of our society so protecting them from illness is a priority.

“Identifying that we have a skilled nursing workforce in this sector and recognising that they are best placed to vaccinate residents means that this new approach not only ensures residents feel more comfortable and safe being given a vaccination by someone they know, but it also frees up vital NHS resource by taking some of the burden off GP practices and Primary Care Networks.

“We were so impressed with how the pilot went and the feedback we received that it then gave us the opportunity to roll this new way of working out across the patch.”

In total, Lancashire and South Cumbria has 134 care homes with 6,546 nursing beds. The previous delivery model relied on primary care services to deliver the vaccinations in nursing homes but feedback from providers identified challenges in providing timely vaccination, particularly for residents with complex needs, including dementia.

This new way of working enables nursing homes to act as commissioned vaccination providers, which means that nursing staff receive appropriate training, access to vaccination recording systems and governance support.

Vaccinations are provided to residents and staff within the nursing home setting, reducing reliance on external providers and supporting peer-to-peer staff vaccination.

Carole added: “The amount of nursing homes that have opted in to this new way of working speaks volumes in how successful this new approach has been.

“I’m very proud of this piece of work and the team that have helped implement it, also of the staff in the nursing homes who have trusted us to work with them and support them with a new skill set that they have embraced.”