Two midwives at The Princess Alexandra Hospital NHS Trust (PAHT) have been shortlisted for the prestigious Nursing Times Awards.
Anna Croot, fetal monitoring project midwife, and Natasha McCormack, healthy lifestyle midwife, have been recognised in the Midwife of the Year category.
Anna joined PAHT in 2011 as a student midwife, and qualified in 2014. Natasha began her career as a nurse in 1998, and worked in central London reproductive and sexual health services before qualifying as a midwife in 2011 when she joined PAHT.
Anna’s nomination recognises the cohesive guidelines, training and support programme she has developed to ensure all midwives and obstetricians are proficient in fetal heart rate monitoring. She is an active member of the National Fetal Monitoring Leads Network, sharing learning, escalating concerns, benchmarking and collaborating nationally to improve support and training for midwives and obstetricians, thus improving care and outcomes for women and babies.
Natasha is recognised for her work to support pregnant women and people as a smoking cessation lead, a role which she has transformed to encompass public health as a whole, and her efforts have seen improvements in smoking rates amongst pregnant women and people at PAHT. She has also developed a postnatal contraception pathway, that now enables the Trust to offer postnatal contraceptive implants prior to discharge.
Anna said: “I am very grateful to be shortlisted, and am incredibly proud of the multidisciplinary fetal monitoring training and support programme I have developed at PAHT. I’m delighted to represent our fantastic team of midwives and obstetricians, whose commitment to continued learning and service improvement has seen learning imbedded into clinical practice and improved outcomes for women, babies and my colleagues.
“I love working with our team, including our consultant lead, Labour Ward coordinators, training and governance teams, to learn from local incidents and tailor training and support to meet staff needs and increase their confidence.”
Natasha said: “I was very surprised to find out I had been shortlisted, I feel lucky to work with such a supportive team enabling women and people to quit smoking in pregnancy.
“Quitting smoking is a lifestyle change and we approach this with inclusivity and finding innovative ways of working.”
Sharon McNally, chief nurse and deputy chief executive at PAHT, said: “It is fantastic that two of our midwifery team have been nominated in the category of Midwife of the Year in the Nursing Times Awards 2023.
“The dedication and commitment Anna has shown in the field of fetal monitoring, and Natasha as a smoking cessation lead is invaluable. It is wonderful to see them recognised in this way and I wish them the best of luck for the awards ceremony.”