Head of the School of Nursing and Midwifery at Keele University Professor Julie Green writes about why she is excited to join Nursing in Practice’s editorial board.
I was recently approached and offered the opportunity to join the editorial board of Nursing in Practice. I really enjoy reading the journal and love the exciting content that it covers, so I felt that this was a great opportunity and it aligns with my background as a district nurse really well. I’m also hoping to also use the opportunity to write a few articles and to review submissions.
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Here is a little about me. I have been a nurse for nearly 35 years. I am passionate about the care delivered outside of hospitals and within the patient’s home. I seek to raise the profile of the advanced, autonomous nature of this care at every opportunity.
I started my nurse training in 1987 at the North Staffordshire College of Nursing and Midwifery. I qualified in 1990 and worked across both North Staffordshire and Cheshire in a variety of roles in both primary and secondary care. My secondary care experience focused on the intensive care and high dependency clinical areas over a five year period. In 1996, I was fortunate to get an opportunity to undertake my Specialist Practice Qualification (SPQ) as a direct entrant to the community and I became a district nurse. From day one of the SPQ programme, I just knew that this was where my heart lay as a nurse and I fully embraced every opportunity.
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Once qualified, I led a caseload in a busy, deprived, urban area of Stoke-on-Trent. The opportunity to support and care for people in their own home has always been an absolute privilege and being a district nurse is something I am immensely proud of. I also worked as a discharge liaison nurse for a period, working within a large local trust enabling patients to return to the care of their family and local district nursing caseloads. During this time, I represented colleagues as their nurse representative on the primary care trust executive board. This executive board role (1999-2003) gave me my first experience of representation, gathering the views of colleagues and advocating for them within an organisation.
In 2003, I moved to work within education as a lecturer at the School of Nursing and Midwifery, Keele University. Throughout my time at Keele, I have continued to work clinically and, to this day, maintain my clinical competency. I have been the award lead for the Specialist Community Nursing (District Nursing) BSc and PGDip for a number of years and the Director of Postgraduate Programmes. I deliver teaching sessions across all fields of the pre-registration nurse curriculum and within post registration modules. I have a particular interest in community nursing practice and, in 2013, was extremely proud to be awarded the Queen’s Nurse (QN) title; a title awarded to those who demonstrate a high level of commitment to patient care and nursing practice in the community.
In November 2018, I secured the cross faculty role of dean for education, working across the Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences – nursing, medicine, allied health, social work, pharmacy, counselling, midwifery – to support the quality of educational delivery and I also led inter-professional education. In January 2020, I was extremely proud to be promoted to professor of district nursing based on my contribution to professional practice. And finally, in April 2021, I was appointed head of school for the School of Nursing and Midwifery. It is an absolute please to lead a wonderful team to train our future nursing and midwifery workforce.
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Ms Green joins our existing board members: Marilyn Eveleigh, Rhona Aikman and Helen Lewis.
