Recognising Cotgrave District Nursing team on International Nurses’ Day
International Nurses’ Day celebrates the contribution that nurses make to society around the world on 12 May every year, the anniversary of Florence Nightingale’s birth. We’re celebrating all of our 2837 nurses and thank each and every one for their commitment and dedication, especially over the past few years. They have continued to provide outstanding care to our patients through very difficult circumstances and we are extremely grateful.
We have lots of stories and thank you messages to share which you can read here, or head over to the Trust’s social media channels to find out more: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram.
We’d like to share with you one story about our district nursing team in Cotgrave who received some wonderful feedback from the daughter of a patient, which they are sharing to mark International Nurses’ Day.
The team say that their profession values compassion, dedication and empathy in the way they engage with patients.
Patient story
The team had supported the letter writer’s mother for around a year and a half, providing care at home for breast cancer. Initially their main focus was on providing dressings and other nursing care, but as her condition worsened more support was needed. They sought specialist advice from Macmillan Nurses and worked together with the patient’s GP to arrange a special device known as a syringe driver to ensure her medication kept her symptoms, such as pain, under control.
Sadly, the patient passed away earlier this year and the District Nursing team spent time with the family afterwards, helping them to deal with this highly emotional time.
‘They treated mum with kindness, compassion and respect’
The patient’s daughter wrote to the team, thanking them for their support, saying:
“I am writing to let you know about the amazing support provided by your Cotgrave Community Nursing Team during the last weeks of my mother’s life. It allowed her to stay at home and have a good quality of life in relative comfort whilst she fought the disease.
“The last two weeks of Mum’s life were extremely difficult, and your nurses were absolutely brilliant; ensuring Mum was given the appropriate pain and calming medication whenever she needed it, supporting and advising us how to best keep mum comfortable and getting in the additional support to help with personal care. Above all they treated mum with kindness, compassion and respect at all times and provided me with friendship and support during such a traumatic time.
“We had the support of many nurses (day and night) who were there as soon as I called for help. The service provided was exceptional and reminded me how very lucky we are to have our wonderful NHS.
“Words can never express our gratitude, but I wanted to share with you just how incredible these nurses are because I know they are out there day after day caring for and supporting families during the hardest of times. They should be very proud of what they do and I’m sure you are very proud of them.”
What nursing means to us
Senior Staff Nurse Anna Kirkland added: “As a team, we lead on nursing care in the community and spend a lot of time helping patients with their general wellbeing – changing dressings, making sure they take their medication properly, as well as supporting carers and signposting to others who can offer more support. We also arrange the co-ordination of other health care professionals as needed, through our connections across local teams.
“We believe that our focus on teamworking, effective communication, problem solving and leadership not only make our own profession as efficient as we can be, we also drive joint healthcare including general practice, secondary and social care to deliver the best possible services for patients. Working together we can make a real difference, and it is exciting to see the role that nurses play in this.”
To celebrate our nurses, we are excited to be holding a special International Nurses’ Day Conference on 12 May. It is an opportunity for some of our nurses to come together and celebrate all things nursing. We’ll be welcoming inspirational speakers, Anthony Bennett and Dr Joan Myers OBE, while also allowing our nurses the opportunity to reflect on the impact of the pandemic and share learnings with each other.
