Guidance Notes and Best Practice Guides
MoD: The Ministry of Defence has launched a campaign aimed at encouraging Service personnel & MOD civilians to carefully consider possible repercussions before posting information on social networking sites.
With the campaign comes new MOD guidance for personnel using social media sites like Twitter, Facebook and YouTube, which advises them not to put themselves or others at increased risk by releasing too much information about themselves or other operational details. Called 'Think Before You...', the guidance will be incorporated into Phase 1 training when applicants first join the Services and into other mandated training materials for serving personnel.
DCMS: Girls aged 12 & 13 years old will be able to play in mixed teams from next season after the Football Association (FA) changed their rules for youth football. The move means that mixed teams will be able to compete at under-12 and under -3 level from the 2011/2012 season. Previously when girls hit 12 years old they could no longer play in a mixed team.
DCMS: A new voluntary code developed by the sports sector demonstrating a commitment to create, improve & maintain the best possible governance structures was last week backed by the Sport & Olympics Minister, Hugh Robertson.
The code, published by the Sport and Recreation Alliance has been designed to help sporting & recreational bodies aspire to & maintain good governance and assist those in senior management positions to run their organisations more efficiently. The code has identified key principles to achieving good governance.
BIS: An innovative new tool designed to help improve the patent application process was launched last week by the Minister for Intellectual Property, Baroness Wilcox. Peer to Patent is a review website which allows experts from the scientific & technology community to view & comment on patent applications.
During the 6 month pilot up to 200 applications in the computing field will be gradually uploaded for review on the website. These will include a range of inventions from computer mice to complex processor operations.
DH: Is my diet affecting my health? Am I drinking too much? Am I active enough? Getting personalised health information, whether to address specific concerns or just see how you are faring, can be tricky. But now it will be much easier to check how healthy you are using a free, revamped tool on the NHS Choices website.
The LifeCheck tool asks you a small number of questions about your age & lifestyle which generates an individual health profile & health tips tailored to your needs. You are then encouraged to set achievable goals to improve your health & wellbeing.
FSA: The Food Standards Agency last week published a Q&A document in response to feedback on its guidance on the control of cross-contamination with E. coli O157. The document addresses a number of questions raised by stakeholders in the food industry and in food law enforcement authorities.
DH: Frontline NHS staff and other healthcare professionals who come up with innovative ideas to give better patient care are getting their schemes funded thanks to the Department of Health’s Innovation Challenge Prizes – the first winners of which have been announced last week.
The awards support plans to give all NHS staff the power & freedom to innovate to deliver better patient care. All the winners have proven that their innovation can improve patient care and deliver savings for the NHS. They were all developed to tackle the problems staff saw their patients facing in day-to-day treatment.
The winning ideas are:
* Dialysis at home –saves the local NHS £16,430 per patient every year on average
* Cytosponge – a simple new way to test for oesophagal cancer that costs just £25 per test compared to the £400 cost of a traditional endoscopy
* Scriptswitch – a computer programme used to share information on prescribing nutritional supplements leading to projected savings of £156,000 per year
DUK: Diabetes UKis helping involve people in improving their diabetes care, through a recently-completed 2-year project (User Involvement in Local Diabetes Care), which has led to a permanent online resource for healthcare professionals. This resource is the Making Involvement Happen website, which was shaped by what has been learned from the project – See ‘Charities / Voluntary Organisations / Third Sector’ section for more information.
