Nursing and midwifery staff make up over a third of our workforce and keep our hospital and community based services running smoothly 365 days a year. With such a large number of employees to look after, leadership of our nurses is very important.
To make sure the patient is at the heart of everything we do, we have changed the way our senior nurses work on the wards by introducing more traditional-style matrons who spend more of their time in their patient areas.
Denise McMahon, Director of Nursing, said “We’ve always had matrons leading our nursing teams but patients told us they wanted them to be more visible on the wards and in clinical areas.
“Patients and their relatives wanted to be able to speak to the matrons if they had a query or concern, and we encourage them to raise any issues they have with them straight away where possible.
“In response to the feedback, we decided to change the way our senior nursing team was structured to let our matrons spend more time on the front line working face to face with those who use our services, supported by our new Heads of Nursing.”
With the new structure also comes a smart new uniform for some of our senior nurses, with the introduction of grey tunics for our matrons and black tunics for our heads of nursing – both with red epaulettes. Matrons and heads of nursing will also be wearing belts with their iconic qualified nurse buckles.
The feedback from patients on the new uniforms has been every positive so far. On seeing a matron donning her new uniform, one patient said, “There’s no doubt who’s in charge here!”
Director of Nursing
Denise McMahon
Deputy Directors of Nursing
Pam Smith
Yvonne O’Connor
Heads of Nursing
Julie Pain (Surgery)
Kaye Sheppard (Medicine)
Matrons
Jenny Bree – Theatres and Critical Care
Lesley Leddington – B3, B4, B5, B6 and C6
Nicola Taylor – Children’s Ward and Neonatal Unit
Rachel Tomkins – A2 and C3
Julie Walklate – A3, A4, Coronary Care Unit and Post Coronary Care Unit
Jenny Davies – A1, C1, C7 and GI Unit
Karen Anderson – C4, C5 and Medical High Dependency Unit
Mandy Aworinde – Mental Health Care (Acting deputy)
Angela Murray – Infection Prevention and Control
Yvonne Jones – Maternity
Vacant – Acute Medical Unit including EAU, and C8
Vacant – Emergency Department
