#TeamNorthMid blogs

I am 33-years-old and was born in Somalia.  I came to the UK at the age of 2 and grew up in Seven Sisters so North Mid has always been my local hospital. 

Nursing was always my calling whether I liked it or not! When I was in Year 6 I remember saying at my end of year assembly that I wanted to be a nurse one day but this derived from my mum and aunts always saying I was going to be a nurse. Throughout my years in secondary school I never once thought about nursing, in fact I had no clue what career I would want to pursue.

After I finished secondary school I was at a standstill trying to figure out what career to embark on. I remember going to Connexions to meet with a career advisor who suggested I do career tests to help me decide. To my surprise, every career test I took came up as nursing, so at the age of 19 I decided to accept my calling and accept that my family were right all along.

I did an access to nursing, midwifery and health studies course at Enfield College, completed my degree at Middlesex University and my clinical training at the Royal Free.   When I qualified my mother had moved to Leicester so I joined her there as a newly qualified nurse. My first job as a qualified registered nurse was working in a 46-bed nursing home; it changed my whole view of nursing homes and made me proud to be a nurse. 

I moved back to London in 2018, joining North Mid and I was amazed by the sense of community here. People here are always smiling and so friendly, and it is so diverse, like a big family which I just love.  I work in a nurse-led urology outpatients’ clinic and we see over 100 patients weekly providing a range of services to meet patients’ continence needs.

We are proud to be the nationally leading service for Percutaneous Tibial Nerve Stimulation (PTNS) treatment. PTNS is a low-risk, non-surgical treatment to improve a patient’s bladder and pelvic floor function using gentle electrical impulses. This treatment has been shown to improve symptoms for those with overactive bladders and bowels. What I love about my job is that we provide a holistic approach giving advice on diet and lifestyle not just the treatment. 

I heard about the Chief Nurse fellowship when my manager and other colleagues told me about it and then encouraged me to apply. I love being a part of anything that helps improves people’s experience in every aspect of life. As a nurse one of the many things I am passionate about is ensuring patients are satisfied with the standard of service they receive. It is important for me that we make their experience excellent which has led me to my project idea.

For my quality improvement project I will be focusing on investigating the number of on the day urology procedure cancellations. Cancellations on the day causes inconvenience for patients and can adversely affect the patient experience. It also causes prolonged wait times and waste of scarce resources having a significant financial cost implication to the trust.  I will be exploring the rate of elective urological cases cancelled on the day of their procedure and the reasons for these cancellations.

I am curious as to what my quality improvement project will show and I am keen to get started on this project.  Focusing on this will help improve both our staff and patient experience and a way of ensuring continuity in the level of care we provide at North Mid.