NHS Orkney Nurses awarded Queens Nurse Award

Inga MacKay, District Nurse and Lauren Flett, Midwife and Midwife Sonographer both received their Queen’s Nurse awards at a ceremony in Edinburgh last month. Inga was collecting her award from 2020 (due to the pandemic the event last year was virtual) and Lauren was collecting her award for 2021.

These awards require candidates to be nominated by their organisation for demonstrating high quality, compassionate care. They then complete a written application and are chosen to go forward for the programme after attending an online selection event where they impress a panel of national nursing leaders. 

The Queen’s Nurse development programme involves a range of nurses and midwives working in our communities from across Scotland coming together for a nine-month transformational development journey to becoming Queen’s Nurses. 

NHS Orkney have a number of Queens Nurses who have now received this recognition and prestigious award. The programme, now in its fifth year, consists of workshops involving masterclasses, action learning and conversations with inspirational leaders, as well as individual coaching sessions.

Lauren Flett, our 2021 Queen’s Nurse said: “I was nominated for this award by my manager, Michelle Mackie. The QNIS is a charity and aims to promote excellence in community nursing. There are currently only 4 Queen's Nurses in Orkney and I felt very honoured and privileged to be the first midwife in Orkney to receive the award. I would encourage anyone who is nominated, to apply.

The programme runs for 9 months and is a blend of residential workshops, online workshops, active learning circles and personal coaching. Alongside this, each candidate has to choose an issue for development. It is my aim to set up and support maternity staff with monthly training sessions in obstetric emergencies. Being a midwife in a remote and rural location can pose unique challenges and it is important that staff feel competent and confident when faced with these scenarios.”

Michelle Mackie, Lead Midwife and Operational Manager at NHS Orkney said: “I am so very proud of Lauren. Seeing her develop and her confidence grow has been a delight and it was a pleasure to be there to see her receive her Queens Nurse Award. Throughout her career, Lauren has embraced opportunities to support service change all with the aim of improving the quality of care we give to women.  At the ceremony Queens Nurses were described as agents of change and Lauren epitomises this. She continues to embrace any learning opportunity including completing her generic instructor course for delivery of obstetric emergency & neonatal resuscitation scenario training and most recently her Midwife Sonography as well as the QNIS programme. I look forward to seeing her take her QNIS project forward to the benefit of the whole team and the women we care for.”

Inga MacKay had a busy year in 2020 where she had to deal with her Queens Nurse experience interrupted by Covid and also had the pleasure of giving birth to baby Freddie. She shared: “Throughout the pandemic the Queens Nurse Programme encouraged me to embrace changing our ways of working and use this as an opportunity to work with others to develop many aspects of the service we deliver. It also supported me to nurture the well-being of myself and others”

We’d like to congratulate both Inga and Lauren and look forward to seeing how they use their learning in the future.