Finalists in this year’s You’re a Star Awards have shone brightly amongst a record number of nominations, demonstrating outstanding care and innovative improvements in the delivery of community, mental health or learning disability services.

The awards, which are now in their nineteenth year, honour and celebrate the work of clinical and non-clinical staff, service users, carers and volunteers at Bradford District Care NHS Foundation Trust. Winners will be announced at an awards ceremony in October, the first such event the Care Trust has held since the pandemic.

This year there are 42 finalists across 14 categories: Service user, carer and volunteer contribution award; Working Together; and separate Team of the Year, Teammate of the Year and Unsung Hero for Community Health services, Children’s services, Mental Health Services and Corporate services.

Learning Disabilities team Community Matron Tracey Barningham and Lead Physiotherapist Donna Smalley are finalists in the You’re a Star Awards ‘Working Together’ category for their Keeping My Chest Healthy app and digital hub, which supports people with learning disabilities to look after their respiratory health. Their work has also been shortlisted at the national Health Service Journal Patient Safety Awards, in the Learning Disabilities Initiative of the Year category, and at the Health and Safety Journal annual awards, in the Innovation and Improvement in Reducing Healthcare Inequalities category.

The Trust’s Estates and Facilities Business Manager Liza Pyrah is a finalist in the You’re a Star – Unsung Hero Corporate category. Estates and Facilities staff look after buildings and services, with staff in roles such as security, reception, housekeeping, catering, electrics and plumbing. Liza’s work to recruit apprentices, upskill existing staff and develop a training and development strategy for the Estates and Facilities workforce recently won the People Development Award at the Health Estates and Facilities Management Association (HEFMA) National Awards.

 

The multidisciplinary Proactive Care Team works collaboratively with the wider health, social and voluntary sector to reduce health inequalities within the most deprived areas of Bradford. Their innovative, patient-centred approach to support local people with the most complex health needs has delivered a 41 per cent reduction in A&E attendance. They are not only worthy finalists in the You’re a Star Team of the Year category for Community Health Services but have today (Thursday 5 September) been announced as finalists in the Parliamentary Awards having been nominated by Naz Shah MP for Bradford West.

Care for local patients and service users is at the heart of the Care Trust’s work and finalists for the You’re a Star Awards demonstrate the highest standards of care.  They include:

• the highly skilled, multi-disciplinary Children in Care, Care Leavers and Youth Justice team who effectively engage with, advocate for and never give up on the most vulnerable children;
• Shipley District Nursing Team, who have demonstrated outstanding results for leg ulcer healing and regularly score 100 per cent in the monthly comfort and dignity audit;
• pharmacy technician Patsy Bamber who has been supporting diabetic patients to self-administer their insulin;
• the Special Care Dentistry team who are experts in intravenous sedation for patients with anxiety and additional needs, and regularly share best practice and train others across the district;
• staff nurse Lucinda Gumbrell who led the development of Well Baby clinics in disadvantaged areas; and
• Zafar Iqbal, a support worker whose 15 years with the Early Intervention in Psychosis team has seen him support hundreds of people to recover or have a more balanced life.

In the service user, carer and volunteer contribution award finalist Keith Double is being thanked for 10 years of support to the Trust in improving the patient environment, Chris Rollings is applauded for her work taking service users out for therapeutic walks to enable them to connect with and benefit from nature and Matthew Riley is recognised for sharing his lived experience and community knowledge to help develop and deliver better mental health services and reduce health inequalities.

Awards will also be presented to the three individuals or teams who have this year most clearly demonstrated the Trust’s values – We Care, We Listen, We Deliver – the winners being chosen from monthly ‘Living our Values’ award-winners over the past 12 months.

Commenting on the You’re a Star Awards 2024 finalists, the Care Trust’s Chair Dr Linda Patterson said: “Every year it’s both heartening and humbling to hear of the lengths to which individuals and teams go to make a difference and to support all of our services to deliver high quality care we can all be proud of. I want to congratulate each and every nominee and of course our wonderful finalists for their commitment and hard work.”

All the winners will receive £300 to support their ongoing work to benefit patients and service users, made possible by the kind support of sponsors Sovereign Health Care and Rhodar Industries.

Neil McCallum, Chief Executive of Sovereign Health Care said: “We’re proud to have been the main sponsor for the Care Trust’s You’re a Star Awards for many years and each year we are pleased to see so many shining stars, dedicated to supporting our local communities.”