Thursday 28 October 2010

Health Question Time

INVITATION

First public Health Question Time
at pioneering health centre in South West
 
Culm Valley Integrated Centre for Health in Cullompton is known across the country for its innovations in health care. On Monday the 8th November at 6pm it is hosting its first Health Question Time: a panel of doctors and other health experts will take questions on the subject of fatigue and chronic tiredness.

The Centre leads a multi-centre Department of Health project to explore ways to improve self care in many everyday conditions. This event heralds NHS Self Care week and marks 2 years of exciting developments at the centre, including our CafĂ© Sustain as in-practice community hub and ‘intelligent waiting room’, new approaches to prescribing community activities, the emerging role of a Health Facilitator in self care, and the production of friendly guidance to managing many common conditions at home.

For more information please contact Joey Lee at 07950 961 751 or at joey.lee@sustaincare.net


Details

The first Health Question Time panel will consist of Dr Michael Dixon (Chair), Dr Clare Matthews (GP), Fraser Pearson (pharmacist), Simon Mills (complementary practitioner). The theme is chronic tiredness and fatigue and questions will be taken from patients at the Centre.

Tiredness is one of the most common reasons to go to a GP yet is most often not appropriately treated by prescriptions. Across the UK 57 million GP consultations per year (about 20%of the total) are for conditions that can best be treated at home.

Health Question time is being hosted as part the DH project Integrated Self Care in Family Practice which is based at Culm Valley and also involves Bromley by Bow Centre in Tower Hamlets, the University of Westminster, and the Peninsula Medical School. NHS Self Week runs from the 15th November.

Friday 22 October 2010

Friday...

What a productive morning. Jan and I have planned our 'Late Night Shopping Event' on Thursday 25th November. We planted the seed at 9am this morning and by midday it's off and running. I love that! We have invited Helen Brain who makes the fabulous garlands, Ruth Hawes who creates sugarcraft models for cakes and Jan will get our knitters busy. You see we are lucky, we have a special community around us and with a few emails and phone calls we have ourselves and team and an event. We also have some newly arrived items for our shop but we will hold them back until the 25th. We will spoil you with nibbles and goodies on the night and basically it is an excuse for a bit of a party :)

I have also been in touch with a reporter who would like some cafe stories and photos for an article she is doing on how the cafe has had a positive impact on people's health and I have spoken to the good old Express and Echo about coming to our Health Question Time on Monday 8th November. They are up for that.

We have also put the finishing touches to herb of the month to be relaunched soon. Jan has booked people on to our sessions and workshops, so those are filling up nicely, as well as the day to day baking and making.

All in all it's a good day. Spending time with old friends, special friends and poorly friends gives you a bit of a nudge to remember how lucky you are and at the cafe we have the ability to pull things out of thin air. We do things because we believe in them, because we think they are fun, because people ask us to, because we think they will help. But we do things and there is nothing more satisfying that getting a job done and doing it well.

Wednesday 20 October 2010

The Big Smoke

We sat in carriage 'A' (the quiet carriage), found three seats together next to a woman who was clearly still reveling in the fact that someone in the carriage had just been moved on for being too noisy. Making sound is the biggest sin you can commit in carriage A.
Now Ruth (our health facilitator) and I are not known for our quiet voices and lack of conversation. This was going to be a torturous journey. The woman opposite glared at Simon and myself as we whispered our plans for the day. I took my new vows of silence so seriously that when Ruth got on at Tiverton, I texted her to explain my being mute. So it is off to the capital we go...

At the cafe, today is knit and natter group and I know they will be oooohing and ahhhing over Jan's fabulous knitted mince pies and Christmas puddings. Nicole has taken her new role as corner monitor very seriously and has ensured ever corner of the cafe is ordered and spick and span. Klaas has a good number for his Feldenkrais course - so all is good in cafeland.

Meanwhile Simon (our boss), Ruth and myself are off to the Bromley by Bow Centre to continue our work on the project: Integrated Self Care in Family Medicine. The Bromley by Bow Centre is an amazing place (google it) and it is one of our partners in the project. We will meet with Alex Laird (www.livingmedicine.org) to discuss future plans. Alex is running a course at the cafe on 17th November so book a space if you are interested. She is fantastic so the session will be fantastic. We will also meet with their health facilitators to swap good practice and see how the project is developing in a different area. Now the end of my forefinger is numb from typing this on my phone's keyboard so I will leave it there for now and edit all the mistakes when I reunite with my laptop :)

The Big Smoke

We sat in carriage A (the quiet carriage) found three seats together next to a woman who was still rebelling in the fact that someone in the carriage had just been moved on for being too noisy. That's the biggest sin you can commit in carriage A.
Now Ruth(our health facilitator) and I are not know for our quiet voices and lack of conversation. This was going to be a torturous journey. The woman opposite glared at Simon and myself as we whispered our plans for the day. I took my new vows of silence so seriously that when Ruth got on at Tiverton, I texted her to explain.

Anyway, today is knit and natter group at the cafe and I know they will be oooohing and ahhhing over Jan's fabulous knitted mince pies and Christmas puddings. Nicole has taken her new role as corner monitor very serious and has ensured ever corner of the cafe is ordered and Spick and span. Klaas has a good number for his Feldenkrais course so all is good in cafeland.

Meanwhile Simon (our boss), Ruth and myself are off to the Bromley by Bow centre so continue our work on the project: Integrated Self Care in Family Medicine. It is an amazing place (google it) and is one of our partners in the project. We will meet with Alex Laird (www.livingmedicine.org) to discuss future plans. Alex is running a course at the cafe on 17th November so book a space if you are interested. The end of my forefinger is numb from typing this on my phone's keyboard so I will leave it there for now and edit all the mistakes when I reunite with my laptop :)

Tuesday 19 October 2010

Feldenkrais Workshop - Force of Habit Part 1


Tomorrow (Wednesday 20th October) Klaas Overzee is running the first of four new Feldenkrais sessions. He is kindly subsidising these so they are only £4 a session. Feldenkrais is an amazing technique. During the last session that Klaas ran at the cafe we had people getting up from a chair without support, something they hadn't done for years and something many of us take for granted many times every day. Whatever your level of mobility, Feldenkrais will teach you something new and beneficial.
Klaas Overzee showing Andi a new technique
Feldenkrais Workshop - Force of Habit Part 1 with Klaas Overzee. In part 1 we will be looking at how we tend to hold ourselves back through our habits. Once a movement becomes habitual we hardly ever spend time perfecting how we perform such an action. This can often lead to discomfort or even chronic pain. £4 per session.
Phone 01884 831300 and ask for the cafe.
Please contact us if you are interested in joining us for this workshop.
My Mum (in the white trousers) learning to stand from a seated position

Monday 18 October 2010

Bless this Cafe!

There is something about Monday mornings that makes my heart sing. This morning was no different. A lovely couple came in and told me about something that had happened. Well actually they didn't tell me; they couldn't tell me so they riddled. But the gist was that they had wished for something to happen when they were explaining a problem to me on a previous cafe visit and it seems to have come true. They said the cafe must be blessed. Maybe soon I will get the whole story. Mrs J wanted to tell me about her lovely weekend and Mrs S came in for a chat and said how the cafe had made such a difference to her. Mr & Mrs M offered to adopt me - now that's got to be the offer of the century. Christine, Hannah and Nicole were busy bunnies in the kitchen and I had to put strangers together as we ran out of tables but they didn't stay strangers for long. The cafe is an all round good place. Well done cafe people.


Printing workshop was brilliant. I was on the phone to a Phd student who is researching restorative gardens so missed the start but walked into an origami workshop. Brilliant. Then a table of three children joined in and before long we had a production line (see photos). Tom showed me frog origami in exchange for petal origami and what a delight they were (the children not the frogs). Lisa continued the printing later on but I had to go to a meeting in Exeter. And boy were we creative. We have plans and big plans. A little like the riddling earlier I will tell you as soon as I can...

Sunday 17 October 2010

Fancy being on Question Time? Now's your chance...

We don't like to make things easy for ourselves. Sitting down with a cup of tea and our feet up just isn't our style at cafe sustain - that's the customers' prerogative. As we are part of an exciting project on self care, we thought we would do something a bit 'outside the box' giving patients the chance to quiz their healthcare professionals on a particular topic - hence HEALTH QUESTION TIME. The first topic will be tiredness and fatigue and this is how it will work:
1. Patients/community/cafe customers turn up at 6pm on Monday 8th November - free tickets available from Cafe Sustain (ring 01884 831300 and ask for cafe).
2. We have organised a panel of health professionals: Dr Dixon (GP), Dr Matthews (GP), Fraser Pearman (pharmacist) and  Simon Mills (Self Care project lead).
3. We ask you to submit questions on TIREDNESS AND FATIGUE for the panel to answer.
4. The session will run like Question Time on the television or Gardeners' Question Time on the radio.
5. We have invited the press to make it a bit more exciting and the Department of Health are very supportive of our idea which means we could well be recorded.
6. It will be an opportunity to hear, from a variety of perspectives, ways to manage tiredness and fatigue.
7. If this is the success I feel it will be, then we will go on to plan future Question Times on other health conditions. So please support us. It will be a brilliant event. Tickets are limited so please get yours from the cafe soon.

Saturday 16 October 2010

Saturday Flu Clinic

How many questions do you think we answer in a day? Or ask for that matter? The phrase, "Would you like hot or cold milk in your coffee?" rings in my head as I've said it so many times today. I have said it three times more than I needed to as I have repeated it often: I speak too fast and my customers are often hard of hearing. Other key questions that sum up my day...
"How were your tomatoes this year?"
"Has the garden done well?"
"What's in the soup?"
"Are you busy?"
"Earl grey or ordinary?"
"Another go on the tombola?"
"What are you looking for?"
So nothing very exciting but we did have a huge number of lovely people who appreciated our cups of tea and smiles after being jabbed in the arm with a large needle.

Sadly though...not even a sniff of a prize on the tombola! Though cunningly Jan managed a couple of second hand prizes. I think she will look fabulous in her new floral pinny whilst scoffing liquorice allsorts!

Friday 15 October 2010

Fame at Last?!

Filming went well and we all got stuck in. The film is being screened in the House of Commons in a couple of weeks so if you're in London and happen to be in government, let us know how we came across :) I had 20 seconds - well that's so ridiculous. I said that you can't fit what we do into 20 seconds! He let me talk for longer but I spoke fast meaning I got the equivalent of 40 seconds. That thing when you have to look at the interviewer, even though he is 6'5'' and it gave me a crick neck. And the part where they make you start by saying your name and spelling it, giving your job title and company and spelling it - well I was exhausted by the end of that challenge and the interview hadn't even started.

Jan and Nikki had a greater challenge, to look consistently busy whilst staying silent so as not to interrupt the interview. Whilst the crew were elsewhere, we whipped up a Devonshire apple traybake and a date flapjack only for them to walk back into an event-free kitchen. Well Quintin the cameraman had plans - could Jan and Nikki repeat the events of the last hour ???!! Well they could...whether they wanted to was a different matter. So out came the bramblies and the peeler. Poor Nikki with a camera up her nose and a sharp knife in her hand. Day to day kitchen life is easy compared to a day being filmed. Oh how we have suddenly developed a new respect for Katie Price and the Osbournes!

Jamie at Home

Thank you to everyone who supported our 'Jamie at Home' party on Wednesday night. We had a lovely time and the cupcakes we great :) Our share of the profits have gone into buying some fabulous Jamie Oliver storage jars. These will be on sale in our shop at £6 each. It means all profits go back into our community :)

Friday 8 October 2010

Lunch!

Pop in today...Nicole has farmhouse mince with smoked paprika and delicious home made french onion soup :)

Oh Boy!

Right here goes on blog number 3!