Dear colleagues,

We’re always looking for ways to reduce our waiting lists, so I’m pleased to share our progress in getting patients needing gallbladder surgery seen more quickly.

Our teams performed 18 gallbladder removals in a single day. And 12 of these surgeries were completed using robotic-assisted technology, which is the largest number of robotic gallbladder operations we've done in one day.

Surgeons control the robot from a console, guiding tiny instruments and a camera through the procedure. They’re able to make smaller incisions, speeding up recovery time for patients and allowing our teams to get through more cases in less time.

Building on the success of our robotic gynaecology surgery, these advances have amazing benefits for our patients. Well done to everyone involved.

Baby Loss Awareness Week

Last week we held a memorial service for families at Queen’s Hospital to mark Baby Loss Awareness Week.

Gina and Peter Reeves, who lost their son Dante to stillbirth at Queen’s Hospital in 2022, had a poor experience with Gina not feeling listened to.

The couple have welcomed that we are one of 14 trusts that will be part of an investigation, led by Baroness Amos, into maternity services in England.

Gina said: "We’ve been back in to meet the new team and have been shown some of the improvements which have been made.

"We have a healthy relationship now and can see that working with the Maternity team can help make things better."

They also founded two support groups, Ebony Bonds, which supports Black families affected by baby loss, and NINE, which encourages Black men to speak openly about grief and trauma.

Gina and Peter will be guest speakers at our upcoming maternity bereavement webinar on Thursday 23 October. To join, please email bhrut.bereavementmid@nhs.net..

Celebrating our allied health professionals

This week we celebrated Allied Health Professionals (AHP) Day. It was a chance to highlight the work of our physiotherapists, speech and language therapists and many more colleagues.

As our Chief Nurse Nic Kane said: "Whether its helping someone recover after discharge, or provoiding ongoing care in the community, our AHPs ensure that care is seamless and patient centred."

Thank you to all of them for the difference they make.

Best wishes,

Matthew Trainer,

Chief Executive