From healthcare workers to school pupils, from small business owners to older people and those living with dementia: the Covid-19 crisis has left no community untouched. And as a university at the heart of its community, the first question that came to mind for Sheffield Hallam’s students and staff was: “How can we help?”
Healthcare was an obvious area: the university’s College of Health, Wellbeing and Life Sciences is one of the biggest providers of healthcare practitioners in the UK. More than 600 final-year nursing and allied health students – 97% of the cohort – volunteered to join the NHS immediately, taking up paid placements early. The college provided specialist Covid-specific training in subjects such as managing personal protective equipment (PPE), recognising the signs which indicate a patient with the virus is becoming acutely unwell, and in helping the students manage their own wellbeing and resilience.
“This was a very rapid response, and we worked closely with all our partners, including Health Education England, to redeploy these students where they were needed most,” says Toni Schwarz, dean of the college. “It’s great to see the students wanting to take on the challenge and be at the cutting edge of healthcare practice.”
Final-year BSc nursing (adult) student Joel Burton was originally rostered to work in the community. He is now working on an ear, nose and throat ward, enabling care to continue for patients while staff members were either working with the virus or self-quarantining. “It’s been a great learning experience,” he says. “I’ve learned a huge amount about infection control and PPE, along with building up my skills around everything from airway management to nutrition.”
Fellow BSc nursing (adult) student Kajin Osman carried out her placement on a surgical ward, which was then turned into a Covid-19 ward. “At first we were a little nervous,” she says. “But everyone got used to it. It was a very positive experience and I felt prepared by the university. Everyone has their part to play in a pandemic, and I felt my skills would be useful to the NHS.”
Other departments were also quick to realise that their expertise could help those in the wider community. Dr Claire Craig is a professor of design and creative practice in health and co-director of interdisciplinary research cluster Lab4Living. It brings together design, creative practice and health, using design-led research to inform products, services and interventions that promote quality of life. Much of her work has been with people living with dementia: There are currently approximately 850,000 people with dementia in the UK.
“Because hospitals are now focused on Covid-19, many people with dementia were no longer able to visit memory clinics, day centres and hospitals,” Craig says. “If people can’t get out, they are likely to lose skills because they aren’t being stimulated to keep their skills going.”
Along with Elaine Hunter, a national allied health professions consultant at Policy and Research for Alzheimer Scotland, Craig and her team developed the Dementia Together website to make their research accessible to a wide audience. The site provides a focus for interactions and engagement in meaningful activities, such as conversation starters, managing routines, games and signposts to other resources. It had more than 2,000 views in its first three days, with many creative and healthcare professionals, from poets to occupational therapists, offering their help. Feedback from people living with dementia, their family members and carers has been overwhelmingly positive. “As a researcher, it’s a real privilege to hear the difference it has made,” says Craig.
Keeping older people active during lockdown is also vital for their mental and physical health. Sheffield Hallam’s Advanced Wellbeing Research Centre has partnered with organisations including Age UK to create a booklet, Active at Home, which has been delivered to thousands of local residents, and will soon be reproduced nationally to 250,000 homes. It provides simple exercises and techniques for older or less mobile people to do around the home, including seated and standing exercises, and also has sections on lifestyle, mental health and local support organisations.
And children’s mental health has not been forgotten, either. Academics working in the Sheffield Hallam-led social mobility partnership, South Yorkshire Futures, have teamed up with Trauma Informed Schools UK and Nifty Fox Creative to develop resources aimed at supporting parents to help children to understand and deal with issues around the pandemic.
The university is also looking beyond health impacts to the wider economic context, helping businesses to get up and running again. As part of the South Yorkshire Covid-19 response group convened by Sheffield city region mayor Dan Jarvis, it’s working alongside local community groups, unions and the private sector to agree actions supporting workers, businesses and communities. The Sheffield Innovation Programme, which provides businesses with access to a broad range of academic expertise and university facilities, is continuing to offer bespoke support digitally, while the ScaleUp 360 initiative is doing the same for SMEs and micro-businesses.
And whatever the new normal looks like, this eagerness to innovate and respond rapidly to a community in a crisis isn’t going to go away, says Craig. “The notion of simply stepping back and saying: ‘This is what we need to do,’ can have a very profound effect,” she says. “Even simple interventions can make a massive difference.”
