It is particularly rewarding to have good care acknowledged by our patients and their relatives and carers but staff are also free to nominate their colleagues for these awards.
We accept nominations for individual members of staff and for teams from our hospitals and our community services.
Nominees must be a member of the nursing, health visiting, operating department practitioner or midwifery team and must be employed by South Tees Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust.
The awards are affiliated to the Florence Nightingale Foundation and as such look to uphold the essence of nursing which involves not standing still but embracing change and innovation.
Unless we are making progress in our nursing every year, every month, every week, take my word for it we are going back.
Florence Nightingale
Our nomination process is open continually with judging at the end of February each year. These nominations are then judged by a team of staff in the organisation including our volunteers services and representation from the local university.
Judging is based on strict criteria and includes several elements comprising leadership, innovation, communication, quality, excellence in providing care, empathy, safety, quality and evidence based practice.
Each nomination is put into its own category so that all of the staff nurses and midwives are judged together, all the sisters and charge nurses are judged together and so on. Each winner from these categories is then put forward into the overall Nightingale Award for the year.
Other awards include:
• Student nurses/midwives
• Practice assessors
• Health care assistants / maternity care assistants / assistant practitioners
• Registered nurses /midwives
• Operating department practitioners
• Teams
• Therapeutic care volunteers
• Military registered nurses /healthcare assistants who have distinguished themselves clinically whilst working in the trust as part of the Ministry of Defence Hospital Unit (MDHU)
• Matrons Awards – this year the awards will be linked to those who have improved nutrition and hydration practice for the trust’s patients