In which country of the UK or Channel Islands do you currently work in?
England
Place of work
Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
Role
Research Midwife
How did you come to be in your current role?
I made the decision to become a midwife aged 18, after the sudden death of my dad. I wanted a career with the potential to make a meaningful difference to other people, as the nurses who cared for my dad and my family had made to us. It was at a university careers day that I decided to pursue a career in midwifery, after a day collecting prospectuses to study biology and become a teacher I spotted the NHS stand and I just knew that was where I wanted to be. I picked up the Midwifery information and went home with a pile of irrelevant teaching prospectuses and changed my career plans on the spot on the bus home! It was an almost split second decision that led me to a career I love and have done since starting my training 26 years ago.
What have been the key moments for you in your career journey to get you to where you are now?
I have been so lucky to have a really varied and interesting career. I started work where I trained as a rotational midwife at Leicester Royal Infirmary, then moved to Nottingham City hospital and then Bradford Royal Infirmary where I settled and have been for the last 20 years. I spent many very busy but happy years mainly on the labour ward and antenatal and postnatal wards with a few short stints in other areas such as the birth centre, triage and transitional care unit.
In 2009 completely by accident I became involved in a collaborative working group for a trial looking into management of the 3rd stage of labour. It was clinical curiosity that drove me to join the group rather that a passion for research at that stage if I’m honest but I was bitten by the research bug and that was that! I loved and still love the opportunity research gives us to question practice and seek answers in order to be able to ensure we can give the best care and ensure families get the best possible outcomes.
The possibilities research gives to be able to offer new opportunities and evidence based, meaningful change provides immense career satisfaction for me. I am so passionate about ensuring research opportunities reach everyone that we have the privilege of caring for.
My career in research has been a whirlwind, working as Senior Research Midwife in my Trust led to regional roles as Champion Midwife for Yorkshire and Humber and Co-Specialty Group Lead for Reproductive Health and Childbirth (RH&C).
I now have a national role as Chair of the NIHR RH&C National Research Champion’s Group and more surreal moments along the way have been filming with Stacey Dooley for Panorama and sharing a stage with Davina McCall and Kim Medcalf at National events.
I never would have dreamed when I started out a career in midwifery that my career would treat me to so many amazing experiences and so many opportunities to contribute to making such a difference to practice and to women and families now and in the future.
What have been the challenges and triumphs in your career journey into current role?
I’m sure everyone is well aware of the challenges of a clinical role in midwifery and research midwifery is no different.
Trying to implement change and new studies in a busy and ever-changing environment brings constant challenge but is also part of what makes it so satisfying to be able to be part of changing that practice for the better.
What advice or top tips would you have for anyone looking to a career move into your role?
Stay curious and get involved wherever you can in anything research related. It could be shadowing the research team, learning about the research studies in your unit, attending a journal club or looking on the NIHR website for opportunities. There are so many ways to step a toe into the research world that did not exist when I first started out in research and it is amazing to see the opportunities for midwives to get involved now.
What do you love about your role today?
My passion for research and leadership has led me to the role I do now which is a combination of 2 days per week as an NIHR Senior Research Leader, 2.5 days as Research Matron for BTHFT and 0.5 as Senior Research Midwife at BTHFT.
I have been very passionate about maintaining my clinical research midwife role for those few hours per week. Partly to keep the involvement in the Maternity research team, to keep me in touch with the role of the staff I manage and abreast of the every day challenge of clinical research but also because midwifery is part of who I am, and has been for my whole adult life, and I didn’t want to lose that.
I feel so luck that my day to day job involves such opportunities to continue make a difference which is what drew me to midwifery in the first place, offering research opportunities to families, changing practice for the better, empowering and developing colleagues and hopefully enthusing other people about research.
