To propose that vets and dentists should vaccinate people right now?

[Destinysdaughter]

I saw this on Twitter, a vet saying he'd be willing to administer the Covid vaccine and someone else said why not dentist too? May be a bit leftfield, but with cases rising at an alarming rate, why not? I'm sure with a bit of training, these professions could be ideal to help accelerate the vaccination process?

@onedayinthefuture

I was given daily injections to do myself all through pregnancy. I can't understand why we can't do it ourselves? Am I missing something?

You need to be within reach of medical assistance when you have the vaccination in case of an immediate side effect - anaphylaxis is the most obvious, but perhaps just fainting.

You could in theory go to a medical facility where someone will sign off your name on the register, get the vaccine out of the fridge, instruct you what to do and hand you the syringe to vaccinate yourself but by the time they’ve done all that they might as well jab you themselves.

Perhaps they’re not keen to work for £12 an hour though, which is about what the NHS is offering professional staff? Many people have volunteered because they want to help but if it means leaving their practice you can’t really expect them to be so out of pocket

Giving the vaccination is the easy bit . You need to ensure you are aware of informed consent . Able to act immediately in the event of anaphylaxis or any other medical emergency . Able to deal with any safeguarding issues that may and do arise when you are in a trusted professional healthcare role.
I'm sure there is a lot of red tape - but you only have to look at the amount of medical negligence claims and the amount of money the nhs lose to this , to understand that this is there to protect the professional and also the patient.

Not forgetting this is a new vaccination- not clexane that you will have been administering post pregnancy .

At this stage I'd let the cat vaccinate me.

People who think you can learn to do this in 10 or 30 minutes are misguided. For those comparing to flu vaccine that is a prefilled syringe so you just literally take it out of the fridge. It also very rarely causes any side effects at all. The covid vacccines are fragile and require very specific handling and storage and expiry. Reading the data sheet would probably take you your 30 minutes and I wouldn’t want someone vaccinating me without having practised injecting or emergency anaphylaxis. Any injections given to patients to self administer come pre-done and have an injection technique which is simple, it’s not really comparable.
This country has done far more vaccines than the rest of Europe, if it was so straightforward don’t you think those countries with more HCP per head of population would be steaming ahead?

I agree @BungleandGeorge you need to be accountable to the drug that you are administering . You need to be aware of the legalities and logistics surrounding this and also have there ability and experience to prepare and give the correct dose to the public alone without supervision.

You only need to read the other thread on here about the ridiculous hoops which retired doctors and nurses are being asked to jump through. Diversity training, radicalisation training, dementia awareness - people estimating 30 hours of online learning.

Nobody's saying you should allow a 16 year old squaddie loose with a load of needles and no training. But there is a balance to be struck.

My vets has offered two vet nurses and a vet to the nhs, they are waiting for the nod having done the requisite online training modules which apparently were mostly irrelevant

Friend of mine is a dentist and filled in their form last week to do covid vaccines. He has already done flu ones this year. Why do you think it's not already happening?

And as she can vaccinate my very wriggly, very bitey dog which a hatred of vets, people will be easy

Isn't the hold up going to be with getting enough vaccination supply rather than having the people to administer the jabs? AstraZeneca has said they could have up to 2 million doses per week available for the UK.

Good to hear this is already happening. I’d have thought vets would be top of the list tbh. Obviously they need to be available for emergencies but every thing I’ve ever taken my pets to the vets for have been routine things that whilst not ideal, would not be the end of the world if they waited 3 months to be done.

I agree, and also all pharmacies in the country (currently able to give the flu vaccination, so why not covid vaccination?).

As far as I can tell, the priority list is causing the system to run slow, as well as the use of solely GPs to give the vaccinations. Those organising the appointments are very hung up on analysing priorities within each priority level. They should just say everyone in priority 1 make an appointment. Then when most of them are vaccinated, say everyone in priority 2 make an appointment etc.

There’s a lot of comments here from people who don’t seem to know what the current situation is. I’m not sure it’s helpful

@sproutsnbacon

Farmers are great at mass vaccination. We can just pen up a town full of people and work through them, a bit of red spray on those we’ve already jabbed. You can get your feet trimmed and a dose of wormer at the same time

With the hairdressers shut in Tier 4, farmers could give you a shear at the same time.

I mean all staff, including non clinical, admin staff, managers (of which I am one). We have work to do for sure, but as I said, many of us could drop what we’re doing to do vax for a couple of weeks.

@feelingverylazytoday it would take one nurse to record a video and put it on YouTube, send a link to mobile phones, play it on TV etc. It would be so easy to do

With the hairdressers shut in Tier 4, farmers could give you a shear at the same time.

They could castrate a couple of buggers I know also.

Re anaphylaxis - I had my flu jab just before Xmas and walked straight out of the GP surgery as did everyone else.

I am a gp... Fully trained up, in good standing, qualified GP.
SO far I have had to do 17 training modules... Not allowed to submit my in date training certificates, had to replicate everything.
And now having to take afternoon of leave to do an online interactive training session.
Which is a nurse reading out phe slides which are replication of the training modules I have already completed.
Its is beyond patronising... I have had to listen to her telling me that "covid is a virus, this is different to a bacteria"
And "covid is a serious illness, some people have died"
I kid you not
I have been working in a covid service since march.

@GreenBacon

Re anaphylaxis - I had my flu jab just before Xmas and walked straight out of the GP surgery as did everyone else.

There is an obligation to observe patients for 15 minutes post vaccination. Not all vaccines are the same.

I agree the training is not specific enough to individual sectors and their individual competencies, nor to the part of the cycle you will be doing. That does need looking at

That should say covid vaccination

@Theredjellybean

I am a gp... Fully trained up, in good standing, qualified GP. SO far I have had to do 17 training modules... Not allowed to submit my in date training certificates, had to replicate everything. And now having to take afternoon of leave to do an online interactive training session. Which is a nurse reading out phe slides which are replication of the training modules I have already completed. Its is beyond patronising... I have had to listen to her telling me that "covid is a virus, this is different to a bacteria" And "covid is a serious illness, some people have died" I kid you not I have been working in a covid service since march.

I cannot put in to words how this makes me feel.

I'm so sorry you are having to put up with such utterly appalling treatment.

Lol funny comments here, I am quite happy to administer this to myself so we can just crack on with life tbh 🤪