Volunteering & helping others

Dr Jo Coldron explains how we can help others, and also benefit ourselves in the process. 

It has been an intense few months for primary care at the forefront of the coronavirus vaccine roll-out. There have been many joyous moments and it’s been so wonderful to see, even briefly, so many of our patients again who have been isolating and shielding. I’m proud of and hugely thankful to all my colleagues, staff, and the band of volunteers, at Tavyside Health Centre stepping up again and again to spend their weekends helping vaccinate our patients; and I know this is replicated in so many GP surgeries, hospitals and vaccination centres around the country. Although these shifts are long and hard work on top of the day job of continuing to provide the same medical care to the community as we always have, they feel invigorating; the communal way of working side by side to attain a clear and important goal allows relationships to flourish in a different way to the more isolated, standard working day. Be certain that every thank you from the patients is keenly felt and hugely appreciated by the whole team.  

We continue to have many enquiries about how people can help us and the community with the vaccination drive, which although going extremely well, is still only in its early stages – a marathon, not a sprint. This is what we are advising people: 

If you are a registered health care professional who is currently or was recently involved in vaccinating as part of your job you may be able to help your GP practice directly after a few hours of covid vaccine specific training. If you aren’t an experienced vaccinator but wish to access training the best route at present is to contact Together for Devon who are coordinating the training and registering of volunteers at togetherfordevon.uk/join-the-vaccine-team. Surgeries may also need help with non-medical roles however, and it is worth contacting them if you feel you may have something to offer.  

Despite the enormity of the task there are only limited ways to help with the vaccination program but there are so many other roles that you can volunteer for to help the NHS and our patients, for example delivering prescriptions, driving people to appointments, talking to people on the phone and checking if they are all right. To find out more about these roles go to the NHS Volunteer Responders website at nhsvolunteerresponders.org.uk/. You can also register yourself, or someone you know, for support on the same link or by phoning 0808 196 3646. 

This pandemic and the required lockdowns have hugely impacted many in our wider community and it will require all our combined skills and energy to recover from this. If you want to help but don’t quite know where to start looking, try the West Devon Borough Council or Plymouth City Council websites or the NCVO site at ncvo.org.uk/ncvo-volunteering/i-want-to-volunteer. 

This desire to help people isn’t just altruistic - it’s well recognised that acts of kindness and giving are good for us and actually make us healthier. Actively taking a moment to focus on someone else and do something positive for them can decrease our stress, improve our self-esteem and happiness, decrease our isolation, make us more active and improve our physical health. It is absolutely a win-win situation. These acts of kindness can take the form of volunteering time and skills to build back our communities, but they don’t have to be that grand. For those with time constraints or their own health limitations these acts of kindness can be smaller, but no less powerful. Perhaps checking in on an elderly and isolated neighbour, or calling a friend to see how they’re doing. To make these acts of kindness as powerful for your health as possible think about what you enjoy, and try and incorporate that into your deeds. If you love films pick a great DVD and send it to a friend to watch; if you love cycling accompany a neighbour on a ride; if you love cats search for the cutest cat picture to send to your friend to make them smile – the possibilities are endless because they are personal to each of us.  There are some really lovely ideas about how to spread kindness at the following website www.mentalhealth.org.uk. Have a look at the pages ‘Acts of kindness during the coronavirus outbreak’ and their ‘Kindness matters guide’.