The British Association of Prosthetists and Orthotists

News

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AGM

The Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the British Association of Prosthetists and Orthotists is scheduled to take place virtually on Thursday 18 March 2021 at 7pm. The Executive Committee invites all members to attend this meeting.

Agenda items are requested from all members of the Association and should be submitted in writing, no later than 11 February 2021 to the Secretariat. This will provide time for a detailed answer from the EC and membership during the AGM and will be answered even if you are unable to attend. A submitted question may be read by the member raising the issue or a member of the EC if preferred by the questioner. Where necessary, all Agenda items will be voted upon in the AGM. If any member not able to attend wishes to make representations to the AGM regarding an Agenda item, they may do so in writing up to 10 days before the meeting.


Non-Agenda questions raised in the AGM which, after discussion develop into voting issues, may be voted on in the AGM or, depending on their importance, may be placed before the whole membership with supporting information from the AGM. The EC under the Chair will decide if a vote must be placed before the whole membership or may be voted upon in the AGM.

Past AGMs have provided a time for constructive discussion of key issues concerning BAPO members and the EC hope that this AGM will be no exception.

There will be 10 Full & 2 Associate vacant seats at the time of the AGM.

Nominations for all available places require a proposer and seconder: if you would like to be considered for election please complete the Nomination Form and return together with a 100 word profile, to the Secretariat Manager no later than 11 February 2021.

I look forward to hearing from you in due course and hope you are able to attend the meeting.

Yours sincerely,

Kate Spiller
Secretary

Return Email/Post: enquiries@bapo.com
BAPO Secretariat, Unit 3011, Mile End Mill, Abbey Mill Business Centre, Paisley, Renfrewshire PA1 1JS

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Dell Association Member Benefits

We are proud to partner with Dell UK to provide a range of discounts on selected IT and other benefits to our membership. 

These include:

  • 10-20% discount off laptops, desktops and accessories
  • Access to Dell’s highly trained Small Business Technology Advisors to help you with free advice to grow your business
  • Dedicated account manager to work with our membership team

To access the benefits, login to your BAPOnline account, select resources & then Dell Member Benefits.  Here you will find the link and unique ID code. 

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Access to Vaccinations

 

BAPO have made a statement across all the home nations on their stance regarding the new Covid-19 vaccination. The statement is below

The British Association of Prosthetists and Orthotists (BAPO) is the professional body representing clinicians working in our field in the UK.

Prosthetist/orthotists are one of 14 Allied Health Professions (AHPs) providing key frontline services in the NHS. They work in many different environments from emergency care to rehabilitation, primary care to schools. Prosthetist/orthotists work with people of all ages and our roles require face to face intervention often with the most vulnerable of society.

Prosthetist/orthotists provide a clinical service to local trusts. They also travel between multiple clinic locations to support wider services such as vascular, diabetic care, paediatrics, elderly care and between different trusts.

Prosthetist/orthotists are either employed directly by the NHS or are subcontracted to provide NHS clinical services as their full-time role.  Due to our small numbers, these key AHPs, working within the NHS directly with patients, can be excluded or forgotten when it comes to national initiatives such as vaccinations for front line staff.

The Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI) advises that the first priorities for the current COVID-19 vaccination programme should be the prevention of COVID-19 mortality and the protection of health and social care staff and systems (30th Dec 2020).

It is imperative that ALL AHP’s, including contracted Prosthetist/orthotists are included in all local vaccination plans for COVID-19 protection. Therefore, all NHS providers should ensure that Prosthetist/orthotists working within their organisation are recognised as frontline patient facing staff and are entitled to vaccination in line with national set priorities. This action will protect the staff concerned, NHS service providers and their patients, whilst ensuring that vital prosthetic and orthotic services are maintained.

We are therefore looking to NHS providers to protect our members, the patients they treat and NHS colleagues they work with.

Regarding the stance in England BAPO has received assurance from the Deputy Chief AHP Officer for England that the current national vaccination plans are to apply to ALL frontline health and care professionals, wherever they work and whoever employs them.

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AOPA

Australian Orthotic Prosthetic Association (AOPA) National Congress 2020, Remotely Connect, Virtually Together

Venue: Virtual event

Date: Thursday 8th – Friday 9th October 2020

Website: https://www.aopa.org.au/events/category/aopa-congress

Description: The AOPA is delighted to invite our wider O&P network and allied health colleagues to the AOPA National Congress 2020 to be held as a live, virtual event from Thursday 8th – Friday 9th October 2020. Our innovative, virtual event has extensive concurrent program, exhibition hall and live chat lounges. The theme for our event is Remotely Connected, Virtually Together and we are pleased to have received extensive exhibition and delegate support during these challenging times. We are also thrilled to announce two keynote speaker, Mr Chapal Khasnabis, Director of Assistive Technology at the World Health Organisation and Mr David Constantine, Founder and Director of Motivation UK. Our impressive international keynote addresses are further complimented by more than 12 invited addresses cutting across orthotics/prosthetics, bionics and pattern recognition, international development, telehealth, digital technology and 3D printing and outcome measures in rehabilitation to name a few. The program aims to be relevant to a wide-breadth of allied health practitioners and rehabilitation specialists and will provide a forum to connect and share knowledge, skills and experiences, and to network on our exciting virtual platform.

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BACPAR

Join us for BACPAR’s first ever virtual conference!

Also, for the first time, BACPAR 2020 will be part of the Vascular Societies Annual Scientific Meeting.

This means BACPAR delegates get access to all content from the VS, SVN and SVT programmes!

Prosthetists & orthotist can take advantage of the reduced AHP delegate rate of £25 to access all content from BACPAR, VS, SVN and SVT.

For more information see the programme

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OTworld

OTWorld Connect 2020 – Exhibitor Brochure

The show will now be held totally digital and companies can upload information and book one of the 3 Packages with prices starting from € 3900. Please see exhibitor brochure above for more details.

Deadline 30th September 2020.

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Orthotist of the Year

BAPO is proud to announce the “Centre for Biomechanics and Rehabilitation Technologies, Staffordshire University Orthotist of the Year Award.”

This award is for an Orthotist who consistently goes that extra mile for patient satisfaction or has a great understanding of what their patient needs. It could be for an Orthotist who has excelled in research or has overcome barriers to allow them to carry out their duties, or who consistently design excellent and innovative orthoses.

The Orthotist can be nominated by anyone, be it their manager, a clinician, a fellow Orthotist, a technician or a patient. The winner will receive a prize of £200 and free registration to the BAPO clinical programme at the BAPO conference in 2021To nominate an Orthotist of the Year simply tell us in under 300 words why they should win this award.
Send your entry together with a completed Nomination Form (available here) to:
BAPO, Unit 3010, Mile End Mill,
Abbey Mill Business Centre, Seedhill Road, Paisley, PA1 1JS
Email: enquiries@bapo.com

The winners will be presented with their award by Professor Nachi Chockalingam, Professor of Biomechanics at Staffordshire University.
Deadline for entries March 31st 2021

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Returning to Practice

HCPC have advised they have some new process and help in place for those returning to practice, taking into considerations the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic, The updates are as follows:

Timescales

Our returning to practice processes will take account of the impact COVID-19 may have had on the timescales within which returnees have been able to complete their period of updating.

We would usually require that all of an applicant’s updating is completed, from start to finish, within the 12 months before they apply for registration or readmission. 

We are temporarily extending this period to 24 months.

Evidence of Supervised Practice

We will support returnees in using evidence of practice as a temporary registrant as proof of ‘supervised practice’, where appropriate.

Our requirements around supervised practice are already permissive and we do not set detailed guidance for supervisors because we believe that the level of supervision needed and the tasks carried out will depend on the returner’s specific learning needs. 

We appreciate the challenges COVID-19 will have presented in this regard and will allow supervisors to make their own judgements on what level of supervision is/has been possible during the pandemic.

Alternative Forms of Study

We will consider alternative forms of ‘formal study’ gained during the COVID-19 pandemic, where these are reasonable and give rise to similar levels of learning.

It will be for applicants to justify this in their returning to practice form; and we will be as flexible as possible in considering alternatives.