Alice Webster will take on the role of director of nursing, midwifery, allied health professions and community division at the Isle of Wight NHS Trust on 4 February.
“Alice has a great range of experience which will be important as we move forward”
Maggie Oldham
She is currently regional director of nursing at NHS Improvement in the South and prior to that she was director of nursing and quality at East Sussex NHS Hospitals Trust.
Ms Webster will succeed Dr Barbara Stuttle, who has held the job since October 2017.
The trust is the only one in England to provide the full range of acute, community, mental health and ambulance services.
It serves a population of around 140,000 people living on the island and this rises to more than 230,000 during peak tourism seasons.
Maggie Oldham, chief executive of Isle of Wight NHS Trust, said Ms Webster was joining the organisation’s executive team at a “critical time”.
The trust was given the worst rating of ‘inadequate’ by the Care Quality Commission in November 2016 and it was placed into special measures in April 2017.
The watchdog returned for another inspection at the beginning of 2018, but the trust failed to make enough to progress to up its rating or be pulled out of special measures.
England’s chief inspector of hospitals, Professor Ted Baker, told the trust it must make further significant improvements to the quality of its services.
Ms Oldham said the trust was now consolidating its “Getting to Good” programme and was developing a “different supportive culture”.
“I am really looking forward to joining the trust”
Alice Webster
She added: “Alice has a great range of experience which will be important as we move forward on our journey to ensure that all patients on the Isle of Wight get the best possible care.”
Qualifying as a nurse, midwife and health visitor in the early 1990s, Ms Webster has worked in both secondary and primary care in the UK and Australia.
Since 1999, she has held a variety of roles within the health sector in East Sussex and is said to be passionate about developing models of care in the community.
Ms Webster was instrumental in the creation of the England Centre for Practice Development at Canterbury Christ Church University with which she has published papers about person-centred practices.
Speaking of her appointment, Ms Webster said: “I am really looking forward to joining the trust and working with teams across the community, ambulance, mental health and hospital based services to build-upon and develop care in which patients and service users are central to everything we do.”
https://www.nursingtimes.net/news/workforce/special-measures-island-trust-appoints-new-nursing-director/7027361.article