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Scheme Details

Health Advice

With the NHS at full stretch a significant number of patients are seen by junior doctors, who rarely have the luxury of enough time to devote to information and rehabilitation. The FirstAssist Medical team can provide confidential and easy to understand help and advice which can greatly aid a patient’s recovery.

FirstAssist can provide pre and post treatment advice in areas such as:

  • General advice, support and clinical guidance
  • Hospital procedures, including preparation for tests, X-rays etc.
  • Explanation of in/out patient care
  • Treatment - do’s and don’ts before and after treatment
  • What to expect on admission
  • The right questions to ask doctor/consultant/hospital in lay person’s terms
  • Rights on second opinions
  • Patient preparation advice
  • How to get to see specialist consultants
  • Who are the specialists, hospitals/consultants in their local area
  • How long an individual is likely to be absent from work
  • Rights, if unhappy with treatment in hospital
  • Can a person request a move to another consultant/hospital?
  • Reassurance

The advisory services provide general guidance and do not intend to detract from or substitute normal primary healthcare. This is not an emergency service and will not provide a diagnosis or prescribe treatments.

Elderly Healthcare

Information and advice is available on, but not limited to, those issues which most commonly affect the elderly, e.g. Parkinson’s disease, Immobility, Arthritis, Alzheimer’s and Senile Dementia. Caring for elderly and infirm dependent relatives can be extremely daunting and can affect retired members of the industry both directly and indirectly. The Medical team may be consulted on the following areas and provide advice on how to obtain the following services:

  • Suitability of medicines by age / condition
  • Suitability of treatment and alternative therapies
  • Common / Routine Medical conditions
  • Mental Health
  • Orthopaedics
  • Prevention of injuries - recommended aids
  • Disability Aids

Junior Healthcare

Advice, information and reassurance are available on all aspects of childcare. The following are some of the most common issues facing members of the industry:

  • Paediatrics - feeding problems, crying, teething, nappy rash, congenital disorders etc.
  • Typical childhood illnesses such as: Measles, Chickenpox, Meningitis, Tonsillitis, and also Allergies, Asthma and Eczema.
  • Adolescent related issues involving drugs and alcohol, anorexia, bulimia, glandular fever and dyslexia are among the many problems associated with this age group and can be discussed and advice given in complete confidentiality.
  • First aid advice can be dispensed for minor accidents and mishaps that occur in childhood.

Women’s Healthcare

This service provides medical advice focused specifically on women’s issues.

Common conditions affecting women eg. pre-menstrual tension, breast cancer, menopause and cervical cancer

  • Contraceptive advice
  • Gynaecology and obstetrics
  • General advice support and clinical guidance
  • Hospital procedures
  • Pre and post treatment advice

Men’s Healthcare

This service provides medical advice focused specifically on men’s issues.

  • Common conditions affecting men eg. prostate cancer
  • Sexual dysfunction
  • General advice support and clinical guidance
  • Hospital procedures
  • Pre and post treatment advice
  • Sports Injuries

Dental Care

One of the most common reasons for seeking advice relates to pain relief for dental problems. Information and advice is available from the Medical team on range of issues including the following:

  • Conventional and alternative pain management
  • Emergency dentistry services
  • Private dentistry services
  • Patient do’s and don’ts

Eye Care

The eyes are a particularly susceptible part of the body and any problems associated with them can cause a great deal of anxiety. Examination of the eye can also indicate other illnesses and it is therefore essential that the most sympathetic and appropriate advice is provided. Information is available on the following:

  • Contact lens information
  • Glaucoma and Cataracts
  • Eye Tests
  • Nystagmus
  • Detached Retina
  • Infections
  • Specialists/Consultants

Alternative Medicine

Provision of information relating to help organisations, support groups and non-traditional methods of healing is available from the Medical team.

Information can be given on the following:

  • Nutritional supplements, herbs and food used to treat different ailments and maintain optimal health.
  • Database of practitioners working with complementary medicine and accredited by their National Society, e.g. The British Medical Acupuncture Society.
  • Information and fact sheets explaining non-traditional methods and philosophy, which appeals to the customer.

Lifestyle Advice

Provision of information to aid healthy living and wellbeing. Assistance with understanding the benefits of food supplements, maintaining a healthy diet and how foods can affect the body and mental wellbeing, sports and fitness.

  • Suitability of vitamins by age, condition and lifestage
  • What each vitamin is used for
  • Healthy living
  • Advice on foods which ease / aid particular conditions
  • Body building supplements
  • Energy supplements
  • Advice on issues such as Sleep and fitness
  • Advice on smoking cessation and alcohol intake
  • General fitness
  • Weight loss
  • Assistance with location of sports and fitness facilities locally

Lifestage Care

Lifestage Care is a nation-wide telephone service providing information, help and advice to individuals who have a caring responsibility for a family member of any age. Individuals can call a trained advisor who has access to a network of Organisations and services covering all aspects of caring. This service enhances those already offered by the Health advisory services. The focus here is on providing the ‘Right Care.’

Where an individual fails to return to work from maternity leave, or resigns because a child, an elderly relative or other family member needs care, the employer loses an expensive investment whilst the individual may be placed in a situation that could have been avoided eg. stress, loss of income, and coping alone.

There are also millions of people who combine caring for a dependant relative with work. The stress of balancing the two roles may put them under the kind of strain that will adversely affect their health, lifestyle, performance, work attendance record and productivity.

The service is led by a team who include qualified doctors and nurses. Between them they have an impressive range of qualifications and experience.

Example modular combinations are detailed below:

Junior LifestageCare

  • Assistance and advice on childcare planning
  • Assistance with locating child minders
  • Assistance with locating nurseries
  • Information relating to childcare social security benefits
  • The legal and employment issues to consider when employing child minders
  • Medical advice and information on all aspects of child healthcare.
  • Information and advice on a range of professional welfare organisation’s and societies
  • Provision of related fact sheets

Elderly/Dependant LifestageCare

  • Assistance with locating home care for an elderly relative
  • Assistance with planning care for the elderly and locating nursing homes, residential homes and hospices
  • The legal and employment issues to consider when employing home carers
  • Medical advice and information on all aspects of elderly healthcare.
  • Information and advice on a range of professional welfare organisation’s and societies
  • Provision of related fact sheets

Counselling

Sometimes just talking through a problem can help reduce its impact. The telephone counselling service is available 24-hours a day, 365 days a year to provide support to customers on a range of lifestyle issues and problems. These can include advice on debt, marital, bereavement or victim support. FirstAssist’s team of qualified and experienced counsellors provides telephone counselling. They are able to engage the caller in a therapeutic relationship and, where appropriate, to continue the contact over a period of time until the problem is resolved. The counsellors are skilled in assessing problems quickly to enable them to provide immediate and ongoing therapy.

All members of the counselling team receive regular individual and group clinical supervision. FirstAssist places a high value upon training to maintain the high quality of the service.

The telephone counsellors are both male and female and represent a variety of ethnic groups and professional backgrounds. This enables FirstAssist to offer a service which covers the full range of lifestyle concerns – including relationship difficulties, anxiety, bereavement, addiction, work-related issues, debt and so on.

Telephone Counselling - Resources and Benefits

  • A team of qualified telephone counsellors - permanent employees of FirstAssist
  • All members adhere to the Ethical Framework for Good Practice in Counselling and Psychotherapy
  • The service is a British Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy Accredited Service, thereby guaranteeing the highest quality service.
  • Additional local sessional resource
  • Highly skilled and trained in telephone counselling techniques
  • Counselling team includes specialists in all areas of lifestyle problems
  • Genuine 24-hour availability
  • Individual and bespoke training programmes
  • Internal and external 24-hour clinical supervision
  • Full accreditation to the quality standard IS0 9001:2000
  • Confidentiality guaranteed
  • Service is open to immediate family and dependants
  • Leading provider to blue-chip companies, trade unions, charities and affinity groups