The efforts and achievements of some of our outstanding members of staff were celebrated on Friday (November 8) with the Exceptional Healthcare Awards 2019.
The annual awards, supported by Southmead Hospital Charity, honoured staff, volunteer teams and individuals for the difference they have made to patients in 14 categories.
The awards, which were hosted with the support of sponsors, recognised staff for providing excellent care, improving patient safety, transform patient services and experiences, coming up with new innovations, and those who go the extra mile.
The record 363 nominations were initially whittled down to a shortlist of 36 with the winners in each category announced at the awards ceremony.
Click here to see the gallery of all this year's winners
The winners were:
Making a Difference: Becky Fowler - Practice Development Nurse
The Making a Difference category, recognises teams or individuals who have consistently provided excellent customer care to either patients, visitors, members of staff or other users.
Becky has been a dedicated and valued member of NBT staff for many years. Her work is diverse covering many different departments within the trust and always focusses on quality care delivered to patients and ensuring staff motivation, development and well-being. Although Becky is a practice development nurse on the Elgar Enablement Unit, her work within the trust is far reaching including supporting other ward areas with their practice development and recently supporting the introduction of the overseas nurses, ensuring they are welcomed to the trust and Bristol. Becky’s enthusiasm, motivation and positivity is second to none. In her role on the EEU she is an exemplary role model not only for her positive qualities but also her clinical excellence is evident within her daily practice and presents an excellent role model for other members of staff
Becky said: “The wellbeing of staff and patients is integral to what we do at North Bristol Trust. My role would not be possible if it wasn’t for the tremendous support from the managers and the fantastic team I work with. Thank you.”
Best Improvement in Patient Experience: Living Well course - Rheumatology Team
The Best Improvement in Patient Experience award recognises teams or individuals who have made changes to the working environment that have improved the patient experience.
The Rheumatology team has provided a ‘Living Well’ course for rheumatology patients, which has made huge difference to individual patients. The group have bonded really well and have been a real support to each other. Since introducing the ‘Living Well’ course patients have made huge changes including two patients who prior to the course had been spending most of their days in bed due to fatigue, pain and depression. Feedback from patients is that they find the course really valuable and have found talking and meeting others has helped them to turn things around. They have also reported feeling much more positive. This course is making huge difference to rheumatology patients and the team deserve recognition for it.
Best Quality Research and Innovation: Shona McIntosh - Vascular Clinical Nurse Specialist
The Best Quality Research and Innovation award recognises teams or individuals who have made outstanding achievements in the field of research in partnership with patients or who have developed or introduced a new product, technique, system or procedure which originated in clinical practice or a research project.
Shona McIntosh is a remarkable member of the North Bristol Trust family, who has recently started her research journey. Shona is a specialist vascular nurse, and her research comes directly from experience working with people she sees in clinic specifically patients with peripheral arterial disease (PAD). Shona is a shining ambassador for NBT, representing all four values: Working well together, putting patients first, striving for excellence, and recognising the person, within her daily clinical practice and her research activities. The Research and Innovation office staff all agree that she is a driven and motivational individual and future leader of clinical academic research within her profession and across disciplines. She is tireless, with a work ethic that is exemplary. She is also an absolute delight to work with.
Southmead Hospital Charity Supporter of the Year Award: Graham & Sandra Daynes
The Charity Supporter of the Year award recognises staff and volunteers who have made an outstanding contribution to Southmead Hospital Charity through fundraising or volunteering.
Graham and Sandra are leading charity ambassadors. With confidence, pride, good humour and compassion, they have personally raised over £10,000 for multiple areas of the hospital alongside endless volunteering. Their staggering duties have included cake sales, Buskathon cash collecting, raffles, brain centre café serving, dressing as Santa and Mrs Claus, bookselling, ushering, flyering, goodybag packing, buggy driving, and washing tablecloths and buckets. And this is all on top of their grandparent duties and separate support for Hearing Dogs for Deaf People and Tortworth Primary School. Loyal and trustworthy, nothing is too difficult or out of the question and the charity say they couldn’t do what they do without them.
They said: “We are delighted and honoured to have received this award, it’s a lovely surprise but it’s not why we do it. We love what we do and will continue to support the hospital to the best of our abilities.”
Inspirational Leader: Rebecca Warren - Radiographer
The Inspirational Leader award recognises an inspirational and resilient leader whose approach demonstrates a positive and sustained impact on those around them.
Rebecca is an inspirational, hardworking and broad thinking leader who does a fantastic job of managing the service. Her enthusiasm radiates throughout the department and she is, in her staff’s words, without doubt the core of their team. Not only does Rebecca support the team, she always leads from the front and has inspired others to achieve more and be the best they can be. She is the figurehead and ensures everything is running smoothly in what can be an intense and stressful environment. She has been instrumental in staff improving their skills and she makes sure training is set in an achievable timeframe whilst ensuring competency with all the procedures and equipment. Rebecca works tirelessly for her team and the Imaging Department as a whole and thoroughly deserves recognition.
Rebecca said: "I am very proud and humbled to receive this award. I work with a team of wonderful people and without them we could not achieve high standards and great patient care. Leadership is not easy and making sure we continually encourage, connect and challenge practice to move forward is something I value and can hopefully continue to deliver”
Patient Safety Champion: Brunel Theatre Simulation Project Team
The Patient Safety Champion award recognises teams or individuals who have improved patient safety, quality of care and/or reduced risk either in a defined area or across the whole organisation.
The Brunel Theatre Simulation Project Team are a group of 3 hardworking Band 6 anaesthetic assistants/ODPs have started from scratch and created a team, equipment and training programme that now deliver regular multi-disciplinary teaching and training to theatre staff, using medical simulation trainers, to improve the quality of patient care and reduce the risk of error and critical incidents. This initiative was started as a project concept to improve human factors awareness to junior theatre staff and empower them to feel confident to speak up and say something if they felt and error or mistake, or something that could potentially cause patient harm. The pre and post training feedback and attitude assessments have shown an improvement in human factors awareness, confidence in dealing with critical incidents and an improvement in speaking up when needed.
A member of the team said: “It’s absolutely unexpected, it’s fantastic. We are thrilled to pieces. It is great to have some recognition for what we have been doing. Thank you so much to everyone who nominated us.”
Service Transformation Award: Front door Frailty pilot project
The Service Transformation award recognises teams or individuals who have introduced a new process or pathway designed to improve the effectiveness of their service and/or the patient journey.
Having started from a small pilot, a multidisciplinary team is now based in ED and AMU to identify and manage frail patients’ needs at the earliest opportunity. For this group of patients this has meant fewer hospital admissions and shorter stays with less risk of functional and cognitive decline. It has been so well received by patients, families and carers that national patient safety expert Sir Robert Francis recently said on visiting that he felt inspired.
The team said: "We were very pleased to win an Exceptional Healthcare Award for the front door frailty project whereby services for the frailest patients admitted to North Bristol Trust are continually developing and improving.
"We would like to acknowledge and thank the wider teams who support us daily in this work."
Team of the Year - Elgar Enablement Unit
The Team of the Year award recognises an individual, a team or teams who have collaboratively worked together to break down silos and solve problems to create a better patient experience or staff working environment.
Members of staff in Elgar are recognised for their strong team work, commitment to excellent patient care and openness to innovation. Many colleagues feel proud and of how the entire team goes out of their way to enhance their patients’ physical and emotional wellbeing so they are ready to go home. They work hard to make patients’ stays less frightening and more comfortable by creating a calm, friendly and pleasant environment with regular activities such as bingo, card games, quizzes, tea parties and craft. Bev and Marianne are both respected leaders, bringing the two wards together with a commitment to equality, open communication and peer support.
The team said: “Thank you for this award we really appreciate that the Trust recognises the hard work of the team last year.
“The standard of care has improved and the patient experience is getting better and better. It is the teamwork in Elgar that has made it possible to achieve our vision of high quality care for our patients.”
Rising Star (Corporate): Charlotte Munday - Perform Coach
The Rising Star (Corporate) award recognises an individual who, early in their NBT career is making a significant impact or improvement at the Trust.
Charlotte has made a huge impact since joining the Perform Academy a year ago from NNMSK physiotherapy. As the sole coach in the Surgical Assessment Unit, she catalysed work to change the way the department ran, which has helped them to avoid more than 70 patient admissions a month and significantly improve patient experience. She has also helped neurosurgery ward 25a to discharge 35% more patients a week. Having completed a formal coaching qualification and led on Perform communications, Charlotte has shown an outstanding commitment to developing people and teams and has a huge potential to lead change in the future.
Charlotte said: “I’m absolutely ecstatic; I never thought this would happen to me. It’s a real team effort, well done to everyone in Perform, but I’m gobsmacked.”
Rising Star (Facilities): Bethany Williamson - Sustainable Development
The Rising Star (Facilities) award recognises an individual who, early in their NBT career is making a significant impact or improvement at the Trust.
Bethany Williamson is passionate about helping staff, patients and visitors to reach NBT by sustainable modes of travel to help our environment and people’s wellbeing. Creative yet quietly determined, she stops at nothing to help people find and try alternatives to car use including borrowing bikes from UWE, negotiating freebies from bus companies and arranging for free bus tickets for cancer patients. She is always cheerful and positive which motivates her colleagues through difficult times. And representing NBT on various partnerships, she uses her wide network of contacts to bring benefits and kudos for the hospital.
Bethany said: “I’m beyond honoured to have been recognised as Facilities Rising Star alongside all the other brilliant finalists at this year’s awards. Every day, my role is rewarding and it’s the staff at North Bristol Trust, who give me the drive and enjoyment to continue making a positive difference.”
Rising Star (Clinical): Ben Ford - Mental Health Liaison Matron
The Rising Star (Clinical) award recognises an individual who, early in their NBT career is making a significant impact or improvement at the Trust.
Ben Ford Ben has recently been appointed to the matron role and has already made significant changes to the way that NBT are able to support and manage the patients in our care who have mental health issues and needs. His calm demeanour and wealth of knowledge provides staff and peers with an invaluable resource. His commitment and enthusiasm has enabled NBT to improve management of this vulnerable patient group and as a result we have been able to demonstrate to external assessors that our mental health liaison services are exemplary. Ben provided a significant contribution to our successful national accreditation to PLAN (Psychiatric liaison accreditation network) in 2018 and has enabled us to provide evidence to our recent CQC inspection that we are safely managing patients who are assessed and detained under the Mental Health Act. Ben is an excellent team leader and brought stability and support to his team who are flourishing as a result.
Ben said: “I am really happy as it’s not just a reflection on me it’s a reflection on my team who do a great job every day and I am exceptionally proud of them. I am so well supported by the medicine matrons and every person I come in contact with in the hospital. I am proud to work at Southmead because of that.”
Wellbeing Warrior: Tracy Wharrier - Band 7 Team Manager
The Wellbeing Warrior award recognises teams or individuals who have gone the extra mile to support and promote the wellbeing of their colleagues.
Tracy has been nominated for the tremendous support she has offered to a colleague in a very difficult time. Her kindness and compassion helped someone at a time of great need, and as well as signposting this person to the Trust Wellbeing service, Tracy gave her own time and efforts to personally ensure her colleague was ok and had all the support they needed.
Perform award: Karen Redler – Wheelchair Services
The Perform Award was given out to a team who have proactively taken up the Perform methodology and made sustainable changes within their area of work. Off their own back, this team has led the adoption of visual management and performance reviews, in order to advance and improve their way of working.
Perform has been in NBT for 18 months now and during this time we have seen some fantastic changes, across the entire organisation. North Bristol Trust chose to adopt Perform to invest in both our patients and our staff – giving staff the tools to work more efficiently, no matter where in the organisation they are based.
Since January, we’ve also seen changes in the way Perform is delivered. As teams continue to embrace and adopt the Perform elements themselves, we continue to move closer to embedding Perform within the DNA of our organisation.
Medical Director Chris Burton introduced the Perform award, which was awarded to Karen Redler in recognition of the work the wheelchair services team carried out to help patients get home quicker when they are ready to leave hospital.
Karen did not know she had been nominated for the award by the Perform coaches who are working with teams across the organisation, so was surprised to hear her name called out.
Chief Executive: North Bristol Trust’s Communications Team
The awards were rounded off with a special award chosen by Chief Executive Andrea Young, and again the recipients did not know they had been put forward for the honour.
The award was given to the Communications Team who tell the story of North Bristol Trust, in so many different and uplifting ways. Over the past 18 months they have undergone an evolution in the way they work – by adopting a divisional led approach, as opposed to a channel approach which has broken down silos and brought the team together as #OneNBT. They have developed a new NBT brand and templates, to support the award-winning Health & Wellbeing team, to enable the Trust to achieve our highest ever flu uptake via an integrated campaign, and to provide a video programmes to raise awareness and celebrate our Hidden Heroes.
Chief Executive Andrea Young said: “It’s very hard to get something like “brand” right but this team manage to speak to our heart and soul.
“It becomes very obvious when you work with any member of this team that NBT run through them like a stick of rock, passionate, fiercely loyal, humorous, and able to bring out the very best of who we are and what we do. It’s a real skill.”
Stephen Lightbown, Director of Communications said: “What an honour for the communications team to be presented with this year’s Chief Executive Award. As a team we were thrilled and completely surprised to have received this recognition.
“We all love working at North Bristol Trust and being able to tell the stories of our incredible staff who provide wonderful care to our patients is a privilege. I want to say thank you to every member of the team, they are a great bunch of people to work with and I feel very lucky to share this success with them.”