BGS Chief Executive Sarah Mistry and Policy Manager Sally Greenbrook visit Nurses and AHPs in the Wessex Region

Lucy Lewis is a Consultant Practitioner Trainee specialising in Frailty and Older People with Health Education England (South).  She represents the #NurseAHPcouncil on the BGS Policy and Communications Committee and has recently become the #NurseAHPcouncil communications rep. She tweets @LucyLew79

As an active member of the BGS #NurseAHPcouncil, I was delighted to hear that Sarah and Sally were visiting ‘our patch’.  The visit was arranged by Colin Nee on his departure from the BGS, as he was keen for Sarah to link with some of the new models of care that are community facing.  He suggested Sarah and Sally spend some time with BGS #NurseAHPcouncil Vice chair and BGS Wessex regional chair Esther Clift who is a Consultant Practitioner in Frailty in the New Forest with Southern Health Foundation Trust (SHFT).

Esther writes: “It was lovely to have Sarah and Sally's presence, and for them to meet some of our patients and see the pathway first-hand. It was also good to talk through their BGS strategy, and see how our Wessex regional work fits!”

SHFT generously hosted an evening Meet & Greet event which provided a rare opportunity for older peoples’ senior nurses and AHPs to meet with one another, hear updates on recent projects and hear from the BGS via Sarah and Sally.

Sarah and Sally kindly took the time to write about their Wessex experience:

Sarah wrote: "Many thanks to Esther, Lucy, Cliff and nursing / AHP colleagues for giving us a glimpse into their professional world. It was so interesting to see different models of care in action, ranging from frailty services that enable people to be cared for in their own homes as far as possible with speedy transfers of care if they need it, through to the arrangements in acute care for identifying and managing significant numbers of people with frailty. Our visit provided a striking illustration of what person-centred care can be if services are joined-up, time is available for listening and engaging with older people and their families, and teams with appropriate expertise work together. How to do that at scale remains a challenge even if the evidence emerges to show better health outcomes, patient satisfaction and money saved.

We valued the opportunity to engage with a diverse array of nurses, physios, OTs and other health practitioners, to hear about good practice and challenges across primary and acute care.  The following day, it was also great to get the picture from the viewpoint of a busy hospital and to hear how older people’s services are being redesigned based on good practice and emerging research. The energy and commitment of BGS members in all locations was inspiring to see. Thank you for feeding in your thoughts to help shape the direction of travel of the Society."

Sally wrote: "It was great for us to spend the day with Esther and see her team in action. We were privileged to be able to join Esther on a couple of home visits to patients and even saw how joined up the pathway is for patients when Esther decided that one patient needed to be admitted to hospital. Transport was arranged for her within the hour and we saw the same patient again when we visited Lymington Hospital a few hours later.

It was really insightful for us to meet with a range of Nurses and AHPs from across Wessex in the evening and hear about some of the successes they have had as well as some of the challenges faced by their services. We had a wide-ranging discussion talking about BGS priorities, as well as the issues faced by health and social care services across the country. Unsurprisingly workforce was identified as a key challenge by all speakers but there was a lot to be positive about as well and so much genuine enthusiasm in the room for the work of BGS. Thanks so much to Esther for hosting us and for everyone we met with for being so generous with your time."

Esther has recently written an article in 'Agility' the journal for physiotherapists with a special interest in older people around the Consultant Practitioner role.

With grateful thanks to Esther for organising and especially to Sarah and Sally for showing such interest in the work of Nurses and AHPs both within our region and throughout the BGS.