First nurse consultant for West Suffolk Hospital

November 29, 2001

The first new nurse consultant for the West Suffolk Hospitals NHS Trust starts in post on December 1st.  Linda Pearce has taken on the role of nurse consultant in respiratory medicine following a successful bid from the Trust for funding to develop the post.

Nurse consultant posts are intended to enable nurses who have reached the top end of their profession to maintain patient contact while still progressing in their career. Previously their only other options were to move into teaching or management.  Now, experienced nurses can pass on their own expertise to their colleagues while continuing to spend at least 50% of their time working directly with patients.

Linda’s new role will involve a higher degree of autonomy compared to her previous post as respiratory specialist nurse. However, she points out that although she will have her own caseload, she will still be very much part of the respiratory team.

“This is not a job I can do in isolation,” said Linda. “As well as working closely with health professionals, I will also be talking to voluntary sector organisations and, of course, patients.”

“Education is an important part of my new job description, and I will be teaching medical students from the West Suffolk Graduate Course.  Education is vital to the future of the NHS as we need to ensure that staff are up to date with improvements in medical science.  Nurses will have an increased role in teaching as education becomes more multi-disciplinary.  This makes good sense, as a lot of routine management of respiratory conditions such as asthma are performed by nurses anyway.”

Nurse consultants are expected to provide leadership and disseminate best practice, as well as undertake research and evaluation.  Linda previously worked as a practice nurse in a GP surgery in Felixstowe, and so she is looking forward to examining the links between local GPs and the West Suffolk Hospital and suggesting improvements.  The emphasis will be on ways of reducing the number of admissions by treating patients outside of the hospital, and discharging patients earlier.  Once again, education plays a part, this time by educating patients about what they can do to manage their condition.

“I will also be looking at respiratory care from the patient’s perspective,” said Linda. “We may think that we are doing a good job, but are we from a patient’s point of view? Listening to patients is a good form of quality control.”

The NHS Plan promised 1,000 nurse consultant posts nationally by 2004.

Health Minister John Hutton said: “Nurses, midwives and health visitors are crucial to delivery of the NHS Plan.  It is right that we should use their knowledge and skills to the full and that they should enjoy career opportunities that enable the most experienced and expert practitioners to continue to do what they came into the profession to do - to care for patients, clients and communities.  The new consultant posts enable them to do just that.”