Lisa Benson Prison Nurse Team Lead in Substance Misuse HMP Grampian, Aberdeenshire I was originally drawn to emergency nursing because it’s fast paced with lots of variety and lots of learning opportunities. After my nurse training, I travelled abroad and worked in a medical surgical unit. Once I had my children, I worked in a…
Specialist and Advanced Roles
Inger McGowan
Inger McGowan Community Justice Nurse The Willow Centre, NHS Lothian Community nursing was a journey to where my clients were, I don’t even think it was a choice. I’ve been in Scotland for seventeen years now, but I was born and raised in the Netherlands. As early as age eleven I knew I wanted to…
Steve Mullay
Steve Mullay Dementia Clinical Nurse Specialist Shetland I came into my present role around eight years ago when I joined an innovative nurse-led service to assess, diagnose and treat people with dementia. The service, which is part-funded by Alzheimer Scotland, arose from a redesign led by NHS Shetland and Shetland Islands Council. I work across the…
Maggie Wilkieson
Maggie Wilkieson Macmillan Nurse Campbeltown I live on the island of Gigha and travel by ferry to Campbeltown where I work as Community Macmillan Clinical Nurse Specialist, caring for people in their homes as well as in our local community hospital. My ‘patch’ is almost the whole of the narrow peninsula of Kintyre, plus the Island of Gigha, with a total population around 9,000 people. I am extremely lucky to live…
Joanna Taylor
Joanna Taylor Advanced Nurse, Clinical Education Lochgilphead After working as a community staff nurse for 18 years, I undertook my District Nurse training in 2015. I recently changed posts and moved into clinical education. I’m now Advanced Nurse for Clinical Education and a liaison lecturer for UWS, a role which allows me to support and champion education for anyone working as…
Gayle Ridge
Gayle Ridge Health and Homeless Charge Nurse South Ayrshire My post within the South Ayrshire Community Mental Health Team covers five hostels and several hundred temporary furnished homeless flats and I work with any individual experiencing homelessness or at risk of homelessness. Geographically, South Ayrshire is semi-rural and the issues that clients present with are as…
Kirsten Kernaghan
Kirsten Kernaghan Sexual Health Nurse Edinburgh I have been working in the area of sexual health with a focus on young people now for the past 16 years. My current role is as an Advanced Nurse Practitioner based at NHS Lothian’s Chalmers Sexual Health Service in the centre of Edinburgh. We work hard to ensure we provide services in…
Alison Bunce
Alison Bunce Senior Palliative Care Nurse Inverclyde Compassionate Inverclyde is a social movement which inspires ordinary people to do things for ordinary people by tapping into our desire to be kind, helpful and neighbourly. When it launched three years ago, there weren’t any volunteers and today there are more than 130 people involved. Inverclyde is situated on the banks of…
Lesley Wylie
Lesley Wylie Lesley Wylie is the manager of a dementia specialist home in Bishopton run by the charity Erskine, who have been caring for Scotland’s veterans since 1916. Proud of the relationship-centred culture within the Erskine Park Home, Lesley is motivated to promote care home nursing role as an innovative and developing area of practice.…
Cathanna Smith
Cathanna Smith Cathanna Smith is an Advanced Nurse Practitioner working in the small harbour village of Tarbert in Argyll and Bute, where she feels privileged to be at the heart of the local community. My Journey I was born and raised in Stornoway in the Western Isles. When I was just three years old, I…
