Welcome to our new chief executive

Our new chief executive, Siobhan Harrington, joins us tomorrow (1 June) for her first day in the role. Siobhan is an experienced director in the NHS and has been chief executive of Whittington Health NHS Trust in London since 2017.

Siobhan is looking forward to meeting as many staff as possible over the coming weeks and months.

Inviting visitors back into our restaurants

We've welcomed hospital visitors back into our Dolphin (Poole) and Shelley (RBH) restaurants, which were closed to the public during the pandemic.

While we know that our restaurants are valued spaces for visitors, we also recognise how important they are for our colleagues, particularly over lunch time.

Our restaurants are open from 7am-7.30pm for the public, except between 12-1.30pm which is protected for our staff only to ensure colleagues have time and space to rest, catch up with each other and enjoy their lunch.

Patients can watch jubilee celebrations for free

UHD inpatients will be able to watch the Queen's Platinum Jubilee television coverage over the bank holiday on their bedside Hospedia units. This has been kindly funded by University Hospitals Dorset NHS Charity.

Between 2-4 June all Freeview channels will automatically be available for free for patients to watch and enjoy.

Speech recognition – reducing delays and the admin burden

We've invested in Dragon One speech recognition software, with licences available for all consultants who undertake outpatient activity, as part of our outpatients digital transformation programme.

Our aim is for all clinicians to transcribe all patient letters in Dragon, resulting in a paperless working environment with no additional resources required to check the validity of the letters produced. Doing so will reduce the administrative burden and administrative and secretarial staff can focus on value-adding roles for patients.

Feedback from staff on the system has been positive, with users describing Dragon as 'slick' and leading to significant reductions in turnaround time for letters from a few weeks to just a few days.

More than 300 license have already been assigned - if you don't have yours please contact the IT Service Desk.

UHD PAS – updated FAQ available

Following our move to a single PAS for the whole of UHD, the supporting FAQ has now been updated with further information, including information on how to move patients between sites.

Many common questions are addressed – if you have a question that isn't please email it to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Job of the week: communications assistant

Would you like to join our busy hospital communications team, working across UHD to share news and updates with colleagues, visitors, and our local community?

As a communications assistant you will provide administration support, help to produce internal and external communications messages, and assist with PR and marketing for a range of services and activities.

Click here to read more and apply by 5 June.

Celebrating biomedical science with Bournemouth University

On Biomedical Science Day (9 June) we're celebrating our collaboration with Bournemouth University (BU) at their Fusion Building.

Join us to celebrate the achievements of our biomedical and medical science students, network with staff from BU and UHD, and view the new biomedical exhibition including research work from current scientists and students.

Tours of our BU's biolabs will also be available for our UHD colleagues.

Sign up here.

Say thank you with a postcard

If a colleague has made a positive difference to your day, or gone above and beyond to help you, you can now use one of our 'Thank You' postcards to share your appreciation.

Over 1,500 cards have already been claimed by teams across UHD, and more are available to be ordered. Simply order your postcards, write a message for who you would like to thank, and either give it to the recipient directly or post via our internal mail.

If you would like cards for your department to use please email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Reminder - update your PC now

To be compliant with national guidelines, all desktop PCs, laptops and surface tablets need to be updated to the latest version of Windows 10. IT will be rolling out a programme of updates, but you can do this in advance by:

• opening the software centre via the desktop or start menu
• clicking the update tab on the left hand side of the screen
• clicking install to update your machine

The install takes up to 60 minutes to complete and may require a reboot.

Find out more in the latest news on the intranet.

Chance to say thank you to Jenny today

Please join us to say a very fond farewell to Jenny House, safeguarding lead for RBH, today (31 May) in the marquee at Bournemouth from 2-3.30pm.

Standing ovation for our UHD Revue

We would like to share a huge congratulations to the team behind this year's staff revue 'Pandemonium', and a thank you to all who supported the production.

The show sold out for two nights last week, providing many colleagues with a well-deserved evening of laughter, and raising nearly £10,000 for our University Hospitals Dorset Charity.

RBH: Fire alarm testing on Wednesday

As Thursday is a bank holiday, this week fire alarm testing for the main building will take place tomorrow (1 June), from 8-10am.

If you have any queries contact This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ext 4296.

Don't forget to say #ThankYou this Sunday

As part of the Queen's Platinum Jubilee celebrations Sunday (5 June) is national Thank You Day. NHS England is encouraging us all to take this opportunity to say thank you to our colleagues and to our patients across the NHS.

We would love to see your thank you messages to each other on our social media. Simply post your message of thanks and tag in @UHD_NHS on Twitter and Instagram and @UHDTrust on Facebook and use the hashtag #ThankYouUHD.

Has your iPad or iPhone been removed from our systems?

Trust issued iPads and iPhones that had been inactive for more than 90 days were removed from our systems yesterday (30 May) and will no longer be able to access trust emails, applications, or other services.

To have your device reconnected and registered to our new mobile management system please raise a ticket via the LogIT Portal.

If you have a device that you no longer need, please return it to the IT desktop support team at either Poole Hospital or Royal Bournemouth Hospital quoting 'iPad amnesty'.

RBH: Increased traffic on Castle Lane East next week

From the 6-11 June roadworks in the public highway outside the hospital require the bus lane running from the Esso garage to Deansleigh Road to be closed.

Buses will be sharing the single public carriageway into Deansleigh Road which may cause increased traffic congestion.

Check in with our research and development team

Our research and development team has released their Spring/Summer newsletter.

In this edition, read about research at UHD changing lives across the world, and find out more about our Dorset Clinical Research Centre and Dorset Clinical Trials Unit.

Supporting our LGBTQ+ community

There's still time to help us to create a more inclusive healthcare setting for all LGBTQ+ colleagues and patients in our rainbow badge survey.

This survey is part of the national NHS rainbow badge scheme and will help our trust be assessed and accredited for our commitment to support the LGBTQ+ community.

Whether or not you are a member of the LGBTQ+ community, please fill out this survey.

You can also read the latest edition of UHD's very own 'Pride' LGBTQ+ network magazine here.

Road closures over the bank holiday weekend

There are a significant number of road closures across the conurbation this weekend, which may affect travel around the area. Click here to view the full list of planned closures.