Western Trust staff celebrate ‘wonderful contribution’ of nurses

Speaking to mark International Nurses Day on May 12, Professor Vivien Coates, Assistant Director Nursing (Research &Development) at the Western Trust said the annual event is an opportunity to highlight the many positive initiatives led by nursing staff that make a real difference for local patients.

“International Nurses Day prompts us to stop and celebrate all the achievements and improvements in care that have been made by teams of nurses and midwives working across the Western Trust in our hospitals and in the community,” she said, adding: “Nursing is a truly rewarding profession that provides a wide variety of opportunities.

“This year I would like to particularly highlight the contribution of nurses working in research.

“In the Western Trust we have a team of clinical research nurses based in C-TRIC on the Altnagelvin Hospital site who facilitate the running of important research studies and in doing so contribute to evidence based practice and promote our Trust as a valuable location for doing research.

“There are also nurses and midwives across the Trust working on a range of research and quality improvement projects on topics that can impact on everyday care as well as contributing to their continued professional learning.”

Florence Sharkey, Research Nurse for the Western Trust commented: “Current areas of study in the Western Trust include dementia care, delirium, ‘specialling’ patients, improving diabetes management, perineal tears (OASIS) project to mention just a few. I have been in nursing for over 20 years in a career that has spanned surgical/medical admissions unit, palliative care, practice facilitation, nurse education and now research. Nursing provides numerous opportunities to work anywhere in the world. I love everything about nursing and would recommend choosing this is a career to anyone.

“It is very important that on International Nurses’ Day we remember the valuable and diverse roles that nurses play in our society, recognise their achievements and the incredibly hard work they do.”