Nursing commission must recruit from outside the profession

Pippa Gough, assistant director for clinical quality at the Health Foundation, said in order to get new ideas on nursing issues the commission’s membership needed to include members of other professions – inside and outside of health care.

‘It should be opened up so we have other [health] professions in there, other disciplines in there, but also people from completely different walks of life,’ she said at a Nursing Times round-table event.

The commission held its first full meeting last week at which members are understood to have discussed how the new NHS Constitution linked to the role of nurses and midwives, as well as identifying the commission’s priorities for the coming months.

Additionally, as Nursing Times revealed last month, the commission’s membership has been increased to 21, with the addition of seven new members:

Sue Bernhauser, vice chair of the Council of Deans of Health
Kuldip Bharj, senior lecturer in midwifery at Leeds University
Dawn Chapman, nurse consultant at Addenbrooke’s Hospital
Dame Liz Fradd, RCN fellow and independent health service adviser
Ray Walker, director of nursing, governance and performance at 5 Boroughs Partnership NHS Trust
Laura Serrant-Green, professor of community and public health nursing at Lincoln University

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