In this section:
This year, why not enjoy a day out at a National Gardens Scheme garden - you'll be helping fund the QNI too!
Providing vital funding for projects that help improve patient care.
Visit our nursing heritage website, a celebration of District Nursing around the world since 1859.
Workshop No.2 - September 2011
Homeless Health: Linking statutory and voluntary agencies in the North East
Newcastle-upon-Tyne, September 29th
The idea behind this workshop was to get an overview of the work going on locally around homeless health and also linking this with the Local Authority in terms of strategy and housing. Speakers consisted of nurses and health visitors as well as representatives from the voluntary sector to explain more about the work they are doing in the area and some of their homelessness projects. The day was chaired by John Unsworth (above, left), who is a member of the Board of Trustees for the QNI. John is Programme Manager for Pre-Registration Nursing Studies at Northumbria University and has a background in community nursing practice, education, management and research. He is an experienced NHS manager having been a Nurse Director in a rural Care Trust in Northern England prior to taking up his current post.
SESSION1: Fiona Richardson and Liz Robinson
Liz is the Strategic Partnership Co-ordinator for the Alcohol Strategy Delivery Board. which brings together partners such as the Police, the Council, the NHS, Northumbria Probation Trust, the Regional Alcohol Office, service user representatives and voluntary sector representatives with the aim to reduce the harm caused by alcohol to individuals, children, families and communities. Liz is currently based within Adult and Culture Services Directorate at Newcastle City Council and works within the Wellbeing and Health Partnership arrangements. Fiona also works for the Council, she is a member of the Drug and Alcohol team and very kindly stepped in for Rachel Hope.
SESSION2:
Trevor Croft
Trevor is the Service User Involvement Officer with Safe Newcastle (Drug Support Unit). He supports people who have been involved with or are still accessing Drug and Alcohol Treatment services in and enables them to move forward with their lives through a number of interventions. The current Drug Strategy places great emphasis on recovery and a key part of his role is to put recovery on the map and make it tangible. He started my career as a support worker in a busy day centre in the west end of Newcastle which caters for vulnerable and socially excluded people who have/may have issues around homelessness, mental health, addiction and the problems associated with these
Rachel Towell
Rachel has been a midwife for almost 11 years working initially in a hospital role and latterly as a community and teenage pregnancy midwife in Salford, Manchester. She has been in the drug and alcohol role in Newcastle for 16 months, caring for women and their families during their pregnancy who are current drug or alcohol users or have been in the previous 12 months to pregnancy.
SESSION 3:
Val Keenan
Val has a background was in general surgical nursing and then midwifery before completing her health visitor training 21 years It was working in the West end of Newcastle with a disadvantaged community where she became interested in the issues and effects of homelessness .She initially covered the specialist role when a colleague was on leave and then succeeded her 5 years ago and now works within the city council temporary accommodation as part of a team who are dedicated and committed to addressing the issues and making a difference to the people’s lives with whom they work.
- Click here to see her presentation - The role of the Specialist Health Visitor for the homeless within the city council temporary accommodation in Newcastle upon Tyne
Claire Johnston and Judith Pearson
Claire specialised in cardio thoracic nursing at the Royal Brompton Hospital London. She worked in this area for ten years before undertaking Health Visitor training at Southampton University in 1993 and worked in the city for a year before moving to the North East. She worked as a Health Visitor attached to a GP practice mainly with a socially disadvantaged client group and then became ready for a new challenge and took up the post of Specialist Health Visitor for Homeless and Transient Families in 2004.
Judith qualified as a Home Economics teacher in 1977 and taught in High Schools in Co. Durham and Newcastle. After a career break she returned part-time as a general supply teacher she then undertook additional training to become teacher for children with Statement of Special Educational Needs who attend mainstream schools. Throughout her teaching career she has been interested in the ‘Whole child’ and the direct link between home environment and the school setting and the impact upon learning and behaviour outcomes. She is employed within North Tyneside Children, Young People and Learning Directorate (Access and Inclusion) and for the past two years I have been based at Wallsend Health Centre within The Transient Team.
SESSION 4: Karen Marley
Karen studied at Northumbria University and has worked in hospital nursing in– Surgery, Gynaecology, Medicine and Emergency Care for ten years. She is currently a Senior Sister in the Emergency Department at Royal Victoria Infirmary. She also spent 7 years as Territorial Army Nursing Officer and has special interests in Nursing Education, trauma, and Discharge Management.
DISCUSSION SESSION: In this session, delegates were asked to think about what they had just heard and what the main points of interest were. They were also asked to think about what they could take back to their own jobs. Click here to see what they wrote.
SESSION 5: Gemma Waldron
Gemma joined the Community & Housing directorate within Newcastle City Council in 2002. Subsequently she developed the Advice & Support service for vulnerable tenants at risk of homelessness and eviction. In 2006 she returned to the city council to work within the local authorities’ temporary accommodation providing a frontline service to people experiencing homelessness. During this time Gemma contributed to the improvement of both service delivery and policy development and was instrumental in ending the use of B&B in Newcastle upon Tyne in 2006, which has since been sustained. In 2008 Gemma started working as the city councils first Rough Sleeper Coordinator and is now managing the Councils temporary accommodation. Gemma is responsible for overseeing the multi-agency case management arrangements for those experiencing exclusion and homelessness. Gemma is committed to improving the services that respond directly to the needs of individuals and families who experience homelessness and multiple exclusion.
SESSION 6: Katie Neil
Katie works for Norcare as the Senior Health and Wellbeing Officer and has been there since January 2010.She was previously a team leader in the Health Information service at NHS Direct where we offered advice and guidance on health conditions, healthy living and researched into more complex queries for callers.
SESSION 7: Neil Baird
Neil is an Assistant Director with The Cyrenians and joined the organisation in 2002. He has successfully influenced both frontline practice and strategic development of the organisation in equal measure. Neil is a passionate advocate for the need to improve the public perception of homelessness and has been instrumental in The Cyrenians communications and public relations agenda. Neil has operational responsibility for a wide range of frontline projects in Newcastle.
- Click here to see his presentation-Homelessness, Pathways to Exclusion and Opportunities for Intervention
- Click here to see the full report:
http://www.thecyrenians.org/news/latest_news/homelessness_could_be_halved_if_cycle_of_poverty_broken
SESSION 8: Steve Gilbert
Steve joined Northumbria Probation Service in 2000 where he was involved in setting up the North Tyneside Prolific Offenders Scheme pilot in 2001. This was the first scheme of its’ kind in the area and was born out of a joint initiative between the Probation Service, Police and Local Authority. The success of this scheme lead to both local and national recognition and it was cited by the Home Office as an excellent example of good practice. In 2007 Steve became the manager of the Newcastle Reducing Reoffending Team and is currently working, in partnership, to development an Integrated Offender Management approach to dealing with crime in the city. In 2009/10 he was awarded a Butler Trust: Commendation for his work with offenders.
Steve's presentation is pending.
DISCUSSION SESSION: In this session, delegates were asked to think about what they had just heard and what the main points of interest were. They were also asked to think about what they could take back to their own jobs. The notes of the session are below:
Group 1:
Signposting RIP
Housing is complex
Group 2:
Steve – motivational, same wavelength
Advocacy, getting beyond stigma
Group 3:
Never give up
Celebrate and share success – its all too easy to be negative as we work in a negative environment
Group 4:
Understanding clients perspective.
Not taken from your own standards
Being non-judgemental
Realistic expectation of the client's future.
What delegates said about the workshop:
I enjoyed the variety of speakers, discussing how we can use what we have learnt from the speakers in daily practice ‘
‘The speakers were excellent, very informative and useful’
‘Opportunity to hear about all of the multiagency working and positive input in this field’
‘Well organised and interesting study day with good facilitation’
‘Fantastic day, feel motivated and rejuvenated to carry on practice’
What delegates said they would do as a result of the workshop:
‘Continued reflective practice to ensure flexible, responsive working. Ideas to research local service provision in relation to my client group’
‘I will look into services to find out if there are any comparable workers I didn't know about in my area and if not, why not’
‘Learned about networks/professional involved in drug and alcohol/homelessness. Aware of who to contact for referrals and advice’
‘Use of health visitor practice, what they can contribute’
‘Being able to access drug and alcohol midwives in Newcastle, even if out of immediate area’
Campaigning for nurses
