How First Touch in Tooting funds neonatal nurse training
Sarah Collins of First Touch NNU in Tooting celebrates the New Year with info on how they fund specialist training for their neonatal nursing team.
Today we are back in sunny Tooting after time away over the festive season. And in the spirit of 'New Year/New Us' we thought we would update you on an aspect of our charity work that you might not be familiar with.
All our supporters know that donations to our charity are used to fund vital medical equipment at St George's Hospital, such as the incubators that premature babies are cared for in and the ventilators that help poorly babies to breathe. From our posts here at Tooting Newsie, many people will know that we work hard to fund a variety of welfare schemes at the NNU to help families, such as offering a Christmas lunch in the Ingredients Restaurant at the hospital for each neonatal parent on Christmas Day, and refurbishing family bedrooms. What you might not know is that we also fund thousands of pounds of specialist training for our super neonatal nursing team each year.
We were delighted to receive this letter from Mariella, the neonatal unit's Practice Educator who is in charge of training for nurses, and we wanted to share it with you. It gives a really glowing review of where some of your donations go and the positive difference they make to staff, babies and families.
Dear Sarah and Louise,
I would like to take this opportunity to thank First Touch for supporting our unit. In particular I wanted to highlight how your support for education has been very valuable and allowed nursing staff to further develop their knowledge and expertise in Neonatal care.
Over the past year nursing staff have benefitted from the following courses thanks to First Touch:
Neonatal palliative and end of life care conference and European Neonatal Ethics Conference. This course has enabled staff to develop specialist knowledge in bereavement care, thus enhancing the care and support provided to families of a child who is on palliative or end of life care.
UK National Neonatal Transport Group Conference and STAN course. This programme will increase knowledge on how to stabilize the baby and how to support parents during the difficult moments of transferring from one hospital to the other.
National Neonatal Nutritional Study. This improves nurse knowledge on the latest research on nutrition and how to support the baby to grow and develop.
The Examination Of The New-born Course. This provides an overview of common clinical problems with an emphasis on the early recognition of infants at risk and their appropriate management.
The Neonatal Nurses Association Conference. This is a multidisciplinary conference centred around the NNU environment. There have been variety of interesting speakers present such as parents with experience in NNU environment, Speech and Language therapists and specialists in the management of substance abuse.
Birth and Perinatal Trauma Course. This will give counsellors a better understanding of all perinatal trauma, its symptoms and long term impact and the everyday impact of trauma symptoms for new mums.
First Touch regularly funds places on a variety of courses to enhance the skills and knowledge of our staff for the benefit of the babies and families on our unit, providing professional development not only for nursing staff but also for our unit counsellor.
The charity's support is invaluable to the work nurses do and the care we provide. Thank you for being such a valuable partner in enhancing our staff education and training for improvement of care.
Best regards,
Mariella Tonzanu
Practice Educator, Neonatal Unit
At First Touch we believe that investing in the dedicated nurses and keeping them at the forefront of knowledge and research is a great way to use charitable funds. We aim to maintain nurse morale by showing how much we value them when we fund this range of training. We also hope that our funding in training goes a small way to helping nursing staff retention at St George's.
Our NHS nursing teams are the lifeblood of hospitals around the country. And our Tooting nurses deserve our respect and appreciation!
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