QNIS Professional Nurse Lead (Leadership), Emma Legge, outlines the programme, and we hear from a 2024 Queen’s Nurse about how completing it changed her life for the better. The Queen’s Nurse Development Programme is a nine-month programme delivered by QNIS and offered annually to around 20 nurses and midwives working in community roles in Scotland.…
An invitation to enhance our own self-care and manage our emotions
As Self-Care Week 2024 gets underway, Nancy Adams, Trainer and Communications lead at Capacitar Scotland, discusses practices that allow us to support our own self-care and better equip us to also support others. Are there times during your day that you are so exhausted or stressed that you would do anything to be able to…
Our bodies hold knowledge: exploring the importance of dance and movement in health interventions
We spoke to Hannah McIlveen, Health Partnerships Manager at Scottish Ballet and a 2024 Queen’s Nurse, about her nursing career, the power of dance and movement, her experience on the Queen’s Nurse Development Programme, and her dream role. I started my career in a nursing home age 16 whilst I continued with my studies. The…
COPE Scotland launches new website with a focus on self-care and wellbeing
As COPE Scotland prepares to launch a new website, the organisation’s Chief Executive, Hilda Campbell, discusses the site’s focus on wellbeing and the importance of promoting confidence and self-belief in ourselves and others. There’s something new happening at COPE Scotland; we are thrilled to unveil our new website, copescotland.com (click here to access). Designed with…
Celebrating the joy of reading for wellbeing
To coincide with the Edinburgh International Book Festival, the QNIS Wellbeing Book Group has written a poem expressing the joy of reading, and how books and the stories within them spark the imagination. Books?! The excitement of a new one! What will I meet? How will it change my world: Will I laugh, sigh, smile…
Strengthening nurse-led community research
Research Fellows, Ben Bowers and Caroline Dickson, discuss the importance of research within nursing, and how to embed it in practical and innovative ways. Research within nursing is generally considered a Marmite concept – you either love it or hate it! That said, nurses are curious, questioning, have considerable abilities to use evidence to make…
Community nursing in action
We spoke to Irene Scott, a community nurse from Fife, and part of this year’s cohort undertaking the Queen’s Nurse Development Programme, about the innovative and practical ways she is taking health promotion into communities. Irene Scott has worked in nursing for 30 years, working for 18 years as a theatre nurse, before making the…
Award-winning nurse reflects on the importance of Learning Disability Nursing
Kerry Anderson is a Queen’s Nurse, and Nurse Consultant with NHS Grampian. Here she reflects on her career to date, her experience on the Queen’s Nurse Development Programme, and the importance of Learning Disability Nurses. “It’s an exciting time for Learning Disability Nursing,” says Kerry Anderson, as she reflects on a recent win at the…
Raising the profile of school nursing in Scotland
Dr Elaine Allan is a QNIS Fellow and a Lecturer on the Nursing MSc Advanced Practice degree at Robert Gordon University. Here she discusses the findings of the recent RCN report on Scotland’s nursing workforce, and the need to raise the profile of school nursing. Coinciding with publication of the Royal College of Nursing’s (RCN)…
Exploring Capacitar as a tool for healing
Debbie Wishart is a Queen’s Nurse and a Health Visitor in Dunblane. Here she outlines the benefits of Capacitar for physical healing and wellbeing, and how the techniques can be used to positively enhance both professional and personal lives. “What is Capacitar?”, is the question people often ask me. A few years ago, I would have…
