From Sue Kruske, Our National Program Director

Above: Sue Kruske with the NSS team

Welcome to the first official newsletter from the National Support Service. We are contracted to provide these newsletters every six months and we want them to be … well…. Newsy! 

So, for this edition we have enlisted the help of a journalist to help us deliver the material in more of a storytelling style. We hope you like it and please let us know if you do, or don’t. 

2020 will go down in history for many reasons but of course the health and economic crisis that resulted from the COVID-19 pandemic has affected every one of us in Australia in some way. Coincidently, this was also the Year of the Nurse and Midwife, certainly significant for the nursing profession, and what a year to demonstrate the selfless sacrifice they made as they came to work to either care for patients on the front line, or to be deployed to other areas of the sector.

ANFPP teams across the country were able to adapt and flex to continue to meet the needs of their clients and families. Care parcels were dropped off, telehealth methods adopted and text messaging increased. We have some lovely examples of this in this newsletter. 

Similarly, the NSS team had to modify how we did business with lack of travel opportunities and the need to move our education sessions online. I am incredibly proud of how we achieved this and evidence of the success of our efforts is seen in the feedback we get from the sites and the increase in attendance at our monthly Community of Practice meetings. 

So, thank you all for your ongoing commitment to support the program. I hope each one of you has some time off over the Christmas break to regenerate and spend time with family and friends.      
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