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Nicola Allen

Chief Executive - CBC Health Federation

My journey to being a nurse started as a child, I am from a family of nurses- mainly male nurses who worked in Mental Health, and then 2 aunties who also trained to be nurses and also worked in mental health, the Old Winterton Hospital as it was then at Sedgefield.

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Their stories of how things were done in their day both mesmerised and fascinated me, looking back to how they were trained to practice, a lot has changed and much of it for the better.

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I trained at Darlington Memorial Hospital in June 1985, 1 of a group of 10 students who spent their first week of training learning how to wear the uniform correctly, fold the paper hat we had to wear with the stripes to identify which year we were in.( And there is a photo to prove it!!) This and how to make a hospital bed with the ultimate hospital corners, a skill i have never forgotten but have less need to practice as the fitted sheet is far more practical and functionable!

I was trained on the wards where you 3 year training program was mapped out in advance so you knew which ward you were going onto, when you were doing days or nights and when your exams were. We had a mixture of written exams and practical assessments conducted on the wards by senior trained ward staff- I can still remember how terrifying those tests were.

 

My ambition from the start was to be a District Nurse which I achieved first joining the Teesdale District Nursing Team as a staff nurse as skill mix was just being started in community. I then trained in my specialist qualification and prescribing serving Teesdale in some of the happiest days of my career. I had the most fantastic office- the huge but beautiful scenery of Teessdale, I worked with a dedicated and hard working team and we worked with a forward thinking and dedicated team of GP's. There was never a dull moment and we had the privilege to serve and support some of the kindest- albeit plain speaking people in the country. I was accepted even though I was an "outsider" ie not from Teesdale but they welcomed me in and I worked up there over 5 years until I took up a Matron post at The Richardson Hospital Barnard Castle.

 

I then moved from there to open the walk in Centre in Darlington one of the first Nurse led facilities of its kind, something i am immensely proud of as we set a precedence, were trail blazers and were extremely successful seeing over 48,000 patient in the first year we opened.

 

I then moved into senior service management leading services such as dermatology heart failure, palliative an end of life care, intermediate care, community nursing teams and minor surgery suites including bowel screening and endoscopy services. I spent a few years working in the surgical directorate using my nursing skills to help design a 20 million pound theatre renovation at Darlington Memorial Hospital, which had to be built whilst still functioning as a busy theatre suite. I became the clinical lead for community services in Gateshead in 2016 and the rest is history.

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I am immensely proud to be a nurse and I feel that during the pandemic nurses stepped forward, went above and beyond and once again showed the spirit of what nursing is all about . I now encourage others to be the best they can be, including actively encouraging others to think about nursing as a career, nursing has been the best thing i have ever done and I have friends that are nurses that I am still in contact with even from my training. Nursing as a profession has changed considerably and I reflect often with my friend on how we were trained and why things have changed now and again often for the better.

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I wouldn't change a thing about my  career, I still get a thrill out of delivering high quality care to patients- my role is just different now but I have never stopped being a nurse. 

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Nicola Allen