Nurses’ Day 2022: CLCH staff meet with Secretary of State and Deputy Chief Nursing Officer
Today we are celebrating Nurses’ Day! Nurses’ Day is observed around the world each year on May 12th, (the anniversary of the birth of Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing) in recognition of the pivotal role nurses play in healthcare and wider society. This year’s theme is ‘Nurses: A Voice to Lead.’
Every year, CLCH marks the day as a way of recognising the hard work and commitment of our nursing staff to the communities we serve in London and Hertfordshire. As a Trust, we are so proud and thankful for the innovation, adaptability and resilience of nurses across CLCH, particularly over the past year.
Chief Nurse, Charlie Sheldon, kicked off the day with a moving letter of thanks to nurses across CLCH: “I would like to personally congratulate all nurses on another successful year and say thank you to everyone in the Trust for continuing to support us and our profession.”
Colleagues from across the Trust then gathered together virtually in the morning for our annual Nurses’ Day conference, which was a great success. In line with the theme for this year’s Nurses Day, the conference focused on celebrating nursing leadership and the power and potential of the nursing voice.
The annual conference was followed by a special Nurses’ Day Schwartz Round titled ‘COVID-19: A patient I’ll never forget.’ The virtual event saw clinical and non-clinical staff come together for a reflective discussion and exchange of their experiences during the pandemic.
The day’s events were accompanied by two VIP meetings with CLCH staff.
Earlier in the week, Zoe Rothwell (CLCH International Nurse Recruitment Project Lead) and Ivy Rico (CLCH Practice Development Nurse) were invited to a roundtable event held by the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care, the Rt Hon Sajid Javid MP. Both shared their experiences of being nurses and Ivy, who came to the UK from the Philippines, shared her story of how she got into nursing.
Ivy said: “Coming from my country and moving here - the adjustment period was really a lot. But I could feel the warmth and the embrace.”
Watch a short video clip from the roundtable on social media.
CLCH staff also had the opportunity to meet with Hilary Garratt, Deputy Chief Nursing Officer for England, during a visit to Soho Centre for Health on Nurses’ Day. During the visit, Hilary saw the CLCH Academy skills lab and spoke to nursing colleagues from our Homeless Health and Soho District Nursing teams about the work they do serving communities across north west London.
It has been a brilliant day of celebrating our nurses and sharing experiences. You can check out our social media to see some of the photos from the events mentioned as well as photos of our amazing CLCH nurses working across London and Hertfordshire.
Lastly, a very big THANK YOU to all our amazing nursing teams and colleagues across CLCH! We are very proud of you all.
