My name is Lindsey Brown and as the new Media and Communications Coordinator here at St Michaels, I am looking forward to keeping our participants and stakeholders up to date.

As Tasmania steers towards Phase Two of the Road Map to recovery, here at St Michaels we continue to welcome new and returning participants. The purpose of this letter is to give you an update of the steps we have taken to keep people safe as we enter this new phase.

We have developed CoVID-19 Safe Plans for each site across St Michaels in accordance with the information for Disability Service Providers in Tasmania, and the Tasmanian Government’s CoVID-19 Safe Workplaces Framework. We have also devised a CoVID-19 Recovery Plan on how we continue to transition out of the pandemic stage as we work collectively with CoVID-19 risks for our sector.

These plans include additional risk assessments of specific activities and individual support needs, instructions to staff on CoVID Safe practices and in supporting individuals to follow these practices.

The most important measures we have implemented to prevent the spread of infection are:

  • Maintaining 1.5 metres physical distance (1 person per 4 square metres in a room) – this does not apply to your support person
  • A health questionnaire for visitors to complete
  • Frequent handwashing and hand sanitizer use
  • PPE use when needed
  • Structured and regular cleaning protocols
  • Coughing and sneezing etiquette
  • Staying home if we are sick

Health screening

As a screening tool, all visitors to St Michaels are required to complete a health questionnaire in order to protect our participants, staff, facility and our community.

Vehicles:

Staff are instructed in hygiene and cleaning practices when transporting people. They also ensure hand hygiene for themselves and the people they support after using any transport.

Areas:

The majority of programs have been able to continue as normal with small changes made to some programs to allow their safe delivery. Our training partner Medecs Learning have launched their online learning with great success, and are still running classes, just with smaller numbers.

For further information visit www.stmichaelstraining.tas.edu.au or phone (03) 6331 7651.

Working alongside other services:

St Michaels is continuing to work alongside colleagues in some residential settings. Our joint clients have been benefitting from the extra collaboration between our services that the pandemic has brought about.

New Referrals and or Returning Participants:

Many participants are contacting us about returning to St Michaels. We continue to support our current participants and have streamlined our internal processes to help facilitate the return to normal programs. To prevent unnecessary delays, please ensure that any documents requiring sign off are approved and returned to us as soon as practicable.

New referrals and requests for returning participants can be emailed directly to pauline.robson@stmichaels.asn.au or rod campbell@stmichaels.asn.au respectively, or call St Michaels on (03) 6331 7651.

Kindest regards,

Lindsey Brown

Media and Communications Coordinator