Search form Search You are here Home » Latest News Northumbria Primary Care’s nursing angels fly high at awards taking home 3 awards Friday, February 14, 2020 - 15:30 Northumbria Primary Care has won three awards at the General Practice Nursing Angels of the North Awards 2020, held this week at Ramside Hall Hotel in Durham. The NHS England and Improvement annual awards ceremony, which was attended by over 100 people and is in its second year, recognises and celebrates the achievements of and innovation in General Practice Nursing. Northumbria Primary Care had six finalists shortlisted in seven categories. Neal Bradford, a healthcare assistant at Cramlington Medical Group GP Practice, won the award for Outstanding Healthcare Support Worker. Coming into the role, he quickly identified areas for improvement within the practice and implemented gold standard practice prior to a CQC inspection, which in part lead to one of the ratings being upgraded to outstanding. Northumbria Primary Care’s, Matron, Maria Towart said: “Team members comment how Neal is the glue that holds their team together, having this kind of impact is a fantastic achievement given his short time in practice”. Neal said: “I am so proud of myself, but at the same time I was shocked. Having only been in this role for eight months, I can’t believe I have been able to make an impression on my team already.” Currently in the process of completing his care certificate to move to the role of Nursing Associate, he aims to qualify as a practice nurse. Trainee Advanced Clinical Practitioner at Ponteland Medical Group GP Practice, Simon Warne, 51, from North Shields, won the Education Award. Having identified his educational talent, he became part of Northumbria Primary Care’s simulation team as an instructor with a new concept of simulation training, which offers a learning environment that mirrors real-life work and scenarios through physical, hands-on experiences for Primary Care staff. Simon’s contribution supported the work published in the medical research journal, The BMJ. A Nurse Practitioner colleague said: “I work alongside Simon and learn from him most days. He remains calm, is direct, and is very confident in what he does. He is an amazing teacher.” On winning the award Simon said: “I was surprised about winning the award, I didn’t realise that my personality would be able to contribute to my teaching, so I am completely honoured my colleagues feel this way.” Maria Towart, a Matron and Nurse Practitioner, from Ashington, who is responsible for thirty-five nursing staff across Northumbria Primary Care, covering seven practices, won the Outstanding Leadership Award. Maria has supported her team to deliver excellent patient care by enhancing care for patients with long term conditions with structured support planning. As well as continuously improving and modernising primary care nursing by introducing clinical supervision and a quality review process for all nurses. Maria, 46, said: "I am honoured and humbled to receive this award especially in the Year of the Nurse/Midwife 2020. I have a fantastic team of nurses and healthcare assistants who inspire me, I could not do my job without their support. I share this award with them and I hope we continue to build on our success in the future to improve, support, maintain and develop high quality patient care" Julie Danskin, Managing Director at Northumbria Primary Care, said: “Maria has developed a culture of care and support and has undoubtedly enhanced both patient care and the profession of primary care nursing I am exceptionally proud and recognise the fantastic achievement and hard work of all the nursing staff within Northumbria Primary Care” NPC nurses crowned ‘angels of the north’ Wednesday, February 27, 2019 - 15:51 Two Northumbria Primary Care (NPC) nurses have been crowned ‘angels of the north’ at the inaugural General Practice Nursing Awards. Margaret Wootton and Catriona Wilkinson were both winners, with Margaret winning the ‘rising star’ award and Catriona taking home the award for ‘outstanding leadership’. Margaret, who qualified as a nurse in 2000 and is now a practice nurse at Haydon Bridge & Allendale surgery, was awarded the ‘rising star’ honour for her enthusiasm and commitment to developing her knowledge and skills, with colleagues in the practice praising Margaret’s work improving patient services, satisfaction and experience within the practice. She said: “I’m really proud to have won this award and would like to thank my colleagues for all the support they’ve given me to help me develop and progress. “It is a pleasure doing my job and I love being able to support people in the community. “To receive such great feedback and the award is absolutely fantastic and a real bonus.” Catriona qualified as a nurse in 2002 and worked in emergency care before training to become an emergency nurse practitioner. She moved into primary care nursing in March 2017 and now works as a nurse practitioner at Ponteland Medical Group. She demonstrated her outstanding leadership skills when designing and implementing an acute telephone triage system, which resulted in GP on the day workload being reduced and allocated to more complex long term care delivery. On winning the award, Catriona said: “Working in primary care presents a whole raft of different challenges and I have really enjoyed bringing my skills and knowledge to a different health setting. “Winning this award is a team effort and I wouldn’t have been able to win without the help and support of the team in the practice.” Julie Danskin, managing director of NPC, added: “I’m delighted that Margaret and Catriona have been recognised with these awards, which is an example of the high quality talent we have throughout our practices. “They are both forward thinking members of our team who have affected real change to how we care for our patients. This is a real testament to their own individual efforts and the culture of innovation that the team as a whole embraces.” Maria Towart, chief matron at Northumbria Primary Care, said: “To say I am proud of them both would be a serious understatement – these awards recognise years of hard work and a ceaseless commitment to making sure our patients get the best care. “They are an asset to their practices and to the whole NPC team.” Seaton Delaval GP practice joins Northumbria Primary Care Wednesday, February 20, 2019 - 16:18 Elsdon Avenue Surgery in Seaton Delaval has become the seventh in the North East to join Northumbria Primary Care (NPC); a pioneering partnership between Northumbria Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust and local GPs. The practice, which was rated ‘good’ by the Care Quality Commission in 2017, has around 3,700 patients and three GP partners as well as a full nursing and administration team. Dr Karen Finch, one of the GP partners at Elsdon Avenue Surgery, said: “We’re very proud of the first-class service we provide and of what our team have achieved to date. “As a small practice we are able to offer an intimate, personalised service to our patients and that won’t change. However, we recognise that, in order to sustain both our unique ethos and the need to provide the best care to our patients, we must be innovative. “The business support we will receive from joining Northumbria Primary Care will enable my colleagues and I to really focus our time and expertise where it matters most – providing and developing high quality clinical services for our patients – while maintaining overall control of the practice. “Being part of a larger organisation will also enable us to draw on more resources and our patients will be able to benefit from a wider pool of clinical staff in the future. “We’re hugely looking forward to this new chapter for the practice.” Julie Danskin, managing director of NPC, said: “We’re delighted to welcome Elsdon to the NPC family and look forward to working with Drs Karen Finch, Kathleen Mackie, Lucy Fisher and their team as they continue to deliver the personal care which is their hallmark. “Running a GP practice is resource intensive in today’s NHS. We hope that by providing many of the professional support functions which are needed to deliver an effective service, it will help ease this burden and let them get on with what they do best.” Set up in 2015 thanks to years of successful partnership working between Northumbria Healthcare and local GPs, NPC now manages seven GP practices with more than 40,000 registered patients in Northumberland and North Tyneside. It provides everyday support to deliver corporate functions, enabling family doctors to focus on providing care to patients. Help us improve Monday, December 11, 2017 - 12:22 Your feedback is very important to us as it helps us deliver the right care to our patients. We would be grateful if you could take a minute to let us know how we could improve – please click here. © NPC2014 | SITE MAP | CONTACT US REGISTERED COMPANY NUMBER: 08985903 Follow us on Twitter Find us on Facebook