By Sam Gourley
Well crew, my sincerest apologies for missing last months company blog! April was a hectic month for me so I have been playing catch-up ever since! Apologies for missing it, I know the communication is important for keeping everyone connected so I'm going to do my best to stay on the ball.
Blair Sneglar
First and foremost, I'm sure everyone is aware of the passing of Blair Sneglar (one of our TA clients) who tragically passed suddenly a couple of weeks ago. She was a beautiful 3 year old client of Steph who had been working with us for a third of her life, and who had made amazing progress while Steph had been involved in her intervention. Blair lived with Angelman syndrome, which is a neurogenetic disorder which affects 1 in 15,000 people worldwide. Blair passed due to a night seizure associated with her condition. On behalf of our Collaborative Partnerships we have sent along our condolences to Blair's family, we have sent flowers and a hamper, and have made a company donation to the Angelman Syndrome Foundation as Emma has requested. If anyone would like to make a further donation to the Angelman Syndrome Foundation in Blair's memory, you can do that here.
Here is a photo of Blair as shared by her parents.
Angelman syndrome is considered by scientists to be a condition which is close to being cured through great research and advances in genetic therapy. They have already been able to cure Angelman syndrome in mice. If your interested in learning more about this amazing work, check out this site.
Staff Satisfaction
Its that time of year again guys! We would absolutely love if you all could complete the staff satisfaction survey. This is our chance to gather feedback from you that will help us make Collaborative Partnerships a better place to work. For those of you who have done this before, you know that we as a management team examine the results closely and we aim to act on every bit of constructive feedback we get from our work family because we are really motivated to make Collaborative a great place to work. Responses are completely anonymous and we would love to get your feedback particularly on things that we have been trying to work on this year (increased communication, supervision, and PD nights). Make sure you pay attention to the last question where you can write any specific feedback on things that you like/don't like.
Feedback
Recently we have been getting some attention on Google Reviews and I wanted to acknowledge Rach A and Alina who got a direct shout out from clients they are working with! Great work guys! If anyone wants to check out the reviews click here. I have popped a screenshot of Rach A and Alina's feedback below:
Now reviews really help us to become more visible to potential new clients on Google, and its not only clients who can share a review. If you have a few moments, feel free to jump on and leave a review of what you like about working with us!
New Clients
After a pretty slow first quarter for both OT clients and TA referrals, the year is finally ramping up with referrals and new clients now streaming in. Last week I did onboarding screening calls for 13 new clients, and I have another 10 this week, with many who are likely to become TA clients too in the next month or so. If any TAs are chasing more sessions in their schedule, or if you have been thinking about opening up your availability a bit more to take on more kids, we expect those TA referrals to start landing in Zoe's inbox within the next month or so.
This is an irrelevant meme for us, but one that made me laugh so I included it:
Kindred Kids
We have successfully launched our Kindred Kids Early Intervention bridging program. It's been wonderful having Erin start to see some kids and for us to start actually offering this excellent intervention to the Sunny Coast community. In the last couple of weeks we have done lots of marketing to local Paediatricians and other service providers. We have managed to get about 6 kids on the program so far through these efforts which is a great result so far. If any of you know kids with ASD or global developmental delays, who have the NDIS Early Intervention funding, be sure to direct them to the website (www.kindredkids.com.au - which will also be getting makeover shortly!) as we dont think it will take long at all to fill up the available places. We have some marketing materials in the clinic if anyone wants to come and read more about the ESDM model.
Use of Space for TA Sessions at the Clinic
Just wanted to say thanks to all the TAs who have previously been using the back room in the TA office for occasional sessions. We have moved sessions out of that space now as it was just too difficult to manage the noise with the psychiatrist next door. Unfortunately the sound conduction just made it impossible. We will be sharing the large front clinic room with Kindred Kids for the time being so if you need to bring a TA session back here to the clinic please coordinate it with Zoe so we can make sure we have a space for you to use.
Staff Movement
We want to send lots of love and positive travel vibes to Toni who will be leaving us at the end of next week. For anyone who doesn't know, Toni is heading to work/live in the UK. Shes looking forward to a long overdue reunion with her sister who lives over there. Toni was one of the first TAs we had on the team back when we first started the TA program while Toni was gaining experience in Paeds as a new grad OT, and then later with us as a fully fledged paeds OT. In the past couple of years she has come so far in her clinical knowledge and skills and its been a pleasure to mentor her during this time. We wish her well on her journey and are keen to follow with what shes doing over there on her socials. We will have a little farewell for Toni next friday 26th May at 10am in the TA room (after OT Group Supervision) so if you would like to come, say goodbye to Toni and bring a treat to share your welcome to!
PD Nights
How good have our PD nights been this year! In April we had Toni present on Supporting Anxious Kids in New Situations, and just this past Tuesday night we hosted Katie Orange (SLP - Montrose Therapy Service) talking all things Augmented Alternative Communication (AAC). I think everyone who was there loved the insights and training. I have recorded that presentation and I'll aim to get that up on the Google Drive shortly for anyone who missed it on Tuesday. Do you have ideas of areas you would like to be trained on? If so let me or Zoe know and we will try to coordinate it into some of the PD nights scheduled for the rest of the year.
Sick Days
Guys, there is lots of sickness around right now. I don't mean the sniffles, I mean full hot/cold, trembling, blocked up influenza B (probably formally known as Covid19). We work with kids and let's face it, sometimes kids aren't all that hygienic! Some of you legends are getting sick, when your sick you try to soldier through and come into work. Guys, I would much prefer you take a day or a couple of days to recover and be back at work when you are feeling better (...and are also not infectious lol...). Just remember, if you happen to fall sick just remember who to contact via 3CX - For TAs, thats Zoe; for OTs and CST, thats Kylie. If you have a clients before 10am, please call or text them to let them know their session is cancelled due to sickness.
Thats a wrap for April and May guys - thanks again for all your excellent work!