One of my rare outings in August….

Yesterday I was speaking at the Induction Day for new starters at NHS Humber Teaching Foundation Trust. I speak each month but assumed August wouldn’t exist for some reason so it was a nice surprise when the usual email popped into my inbox.

I usually speak alongside Cathryn Hart, Assistant Director Research & Development at the Trust, and talk about why research is important in all their roles. But Cathryn wasn’t available this week so had the pleasure of talking with 2 of her staff, Saba and Lauren, both Research Team members.

Lauren had agreed to pick me up from home and arrived right on time. Lauren is the Research Assistant who usually visits me at home when I’m actually taking part in research so it was nice to have a catch up.

We arrived at the Trust Headquarters and went up to their office where a cuppa tea magically appeared❤️. I stopped all 3 working then by chatting away, mainly about cats (😻} and Billy’s recently holiday (blog to follow soon) until it was time for me, Lauren and Saba to go down to meet the newbies.

While we were waiting outside for the Chief Exec, Michelle Moran to finish her bit, one poor newbie arrived late……I told them not to worry and to sneak in with us and no one would notice 😂🤣

It’s only the second time Saba and Lauren have done the induction, so both were nervous, but everyone has to learn and one time has to be the first.

The room was full with a big intake of new staff. These are staff from any department, clinical and non clinical. I made sure I got the obligatory piccie of me and Lauren before we started, with Saba behind the camera.

They went through all the good work being carried out in Humber and why research is everyone’s business.

I ended the session with but weirdly it sounded strange to be speaking out loud to an audience again, even though it must only be a few weeks since I did just that. It felt new and strange. I remember faltering, losing my place.  Only I probably noticed anything was wrong, after all the audience was new so their expectation of me would have been low anyway.  It’s the one reason I dislike August; my routine gets disturbed. I forget the ‘how’.

But I finished off and said….

“You may be sat there thinking, well what’s research got to do with me, it’s not part of my job.We have to normalise talking about research and to do this we must have every healthcare professional, no matter what their job, all coming on board and promoting research. To normalise talking about research would normalise involvement. If you don’t think research affects you, you may change your mind if you or someone close to you was given that devastating diagnosis of dementia.”

Lauren and Saba did a wonderful job and we’ll be the Three Amigos again in September😊

On the way out a newbie introduced herself to me as a new Clinical Psychologist and she was aware of the lack of post diagnostic support and would keep in touch…….well let’s see if words are turned into action……..

On the way out, I spotted one of my playmates Pam and her daughter Jo from Lancashire on some Alzheimer Society leaflets in reception………They travel well!