TEN Magazine April 2020 TEN Magazine April 2020 | Page 24
PRINTING
Hybrid assists volunteer sewists
with digitally printed patterns for
NHS scrubs campaign
With the national
“For the Love of
Scrubs” campaign
in full flight,
hobby sewist,
Emma Dalzell
set up the ‘Mid
Cheshire Hospitals -
Leighton/Northwich’
offshoot to respond
to increasing
requests from local
hospitals for scrubs
and other items
required on the frontline as
the health service continues
its fight against the
coronavirus pandemic.
“Having joined the national Facebook group,
I thought I’d make a couple of pairs and that
would be it, but in conversation with a
contact at Crewe’s Leighton Hospital, I found
there was a desperate need for scrubs in our
area which motivated me to start the local
group,” Emma recalls. In the space of three
weeks since its inception in early April, it now
has around 1,000 members and covers
towns across Cheshire, from Macclesfield in
the east, to Tarporley in the west and extends
south into Shropshire.
“We have volunteer sewists funding their own
fabric, sewing groups pooling their efforts
and even non-sewing volunteers who drive
and distribute the material,” she continues.
“But one of our biggest challenges has been
sourcing patterns.”
These are typically printed on paper, with the
various sizes of each panel of the garment
represented at 100% scale. The sewist cuts
out the appropriate panel, pins it to the
fabric before cutting that out and making up
the garment. “Once we’d found the suitable
24
APRIL 2020
The Magazine for the
Awards & Imaging Industry
TROPHIES AWARDS ENGRAVING DOMING PERSONALISATION SUBLIMATION BESPOKE EMBROIDERY PRINTING IMAGING LASER
Clockwise (from left): Nurse Rachael Slater, Richard
Williams (and his dog, Skye) - one of several volunteers
at Hybrid who have helped print the patterns for the
scrubs, Nurses in Knutsford sporting their new scrubs.
pattern design, a lot of our members were
printing them at home and sticking the A4
pages together, which as well as being time
consuming can lead to potential issues with
incorrect scaling,” Emma points out.
Located in Crewe, not far from Leighton
Hospital is Hybrid Services, the UK and Ireland
distributor for wide format printer manufacturer,
Mimaki Engineering. “One of the team spotted
a Facebook post appealing for help with
producing the patterns,” comments Brett
Newman, Hybrid’s chief operations manager.
“As soon as we realised we could help, a
number of the Hybrid staff volunteered to assist,
returning to our office to produce the plans at
A0 size to help the group with this challenge.”
Utilising the instantly dry UV ink on the latest
1.6m wide Mimaki UCJV300-160, the
Hybrid volunteers were able to output at high
volume and at the larger size, and soon
increased the group’s stocks of patterns,
ready for distribution across the county.
“We’re hugely grateful for the patterns and
we’ve received significant help and donations
from so many places,” Emma continues.
“Our local Morrisons has supplied paper
bags for packaging the finished scrubs –
which is obviously environmentally beneficial
and has practical advantages too, reducing
the quarantine period we have to observe
before passing them on.”
The group’s own fundraiser currently stands
at an incredible £6,750 and with continued
pleas from frontline healthcare staff, the 400
(and growing daily) sets of scrubs already
delivered are having a positive impact. “We
have fabric and patterns ready for producing
a further 600-700 more at present and we’re
working really well as a team to get them to
the people that need them most,” Emma
confirms. With stories like the part time
nurse, whose working hours have increased
from one day to six days a week, but who,
with only one set of scrubs was laundering
them every night, the demand is still very
much there.
“Our work now includes laundry bags, head
bands and a range of different weights of
scrubs that are suitable for using in different
circumstances – from lighter weight sets that
are worn on the frontline under full PPE
through to heavier weight fabrics that are
more suited to the requirements of district
nurses,” Emma concludes. “With distribution
hubs in all the main towns in the area and a
named volunteer who collects and drops off
the products locally, we’re minimising travel
and observing social distancing whilst still
helping an ever-growing group of frontline
healthcare workers.”
Visit: www.hybridservices.co.uk
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