Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust provides acute and specialist care services for a population of more than 500,000 people in Berkshire West. The trust is one of the largest general hospital foundation trusts in the country.

Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust

Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust | 15,683 followers on LinkedIn. We provide high quality acute medical and surgical services for our local communities of over 500,000 people | We are one of the largest general hospital foundation trusts in the country and are the main provider of acute and specialist care services for West Berkshire. With six sites, we employ around 7,500 staff and serve a population of around 1 million people.

We offer services to local residents across Berkshire including:
Acute medical services at Royal Berkshire Hospital in Reading
Ophthalmology services at Prince Charles Eye Unit, Windsor
Dialysis services in Windsor
Day surgery and acute outpatient services at West Berkshire Community Hospital
Cancer, renal and outpatient services in Bracknell
Outpatient services at Townlands Hospital, Henley.

Information Security Officer at Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust

David Woodcock MBCS

CEO at R-Outcomes Ltd

Tim Benson

Patient Safety Partner and Leader at Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust

Nick Brown

Senior Information Analyst Royal Berkshire Hospital

Stephen Dale

🎄 Christmas ads aren't just for department stores, watch ours and see how you can get yourself Winter Ready. This winter could be our busiest yet with already more than 125,000 attendances to our Emergency Department this year. Whilst we are working hard to ease that pressure, there are many things you can do to support us during this time by being Winter Ready. Watch our film to support us over this period. 👉 https://lnkd.in/gSDnpS9s

For Adult Safeguarding Week, Emily talks about her role as a Learning Disability Support Worker. 🌟 Hi I’m Emily and I’ve been at the Trust since April. I’m a Learning Disability Support Worker in the Safeguarding Team. I have lots of links to the Royal Berkshire Hospital – I was born here, came to visit my grandparents when they were both poorly with cancer, and I’ve always wanted to work here. I remember seeing my nan, she was looked after so well and the nurses changed how our family felt about the whole experience. I’m happy that I got to tell her that I was planning to work here before she died, she’d be proud. I’m the first person at the Trust to do this job, so it’s very exciting! Every day I go and spend time with patients in all different wards who have any kind of learning disability, and see what I can do to make their experience of being in hospital better. The support I give is individual, what helps one person might not help someone else. Sometimes we just sit and chat, sometimes it’s doing colouring, playing games, or it could literally just be sitting with them while they rest or eat, or going with them for a scan to offer some moral support. When I was little I used to be really awkward and couldn’t have imagined doing a job like this with people every day. But at some point I was just like ‘nope not being awkward any more’ and it was like a switch flicked, and now I actually love meeting and getting to know all different people and their families every day. I am autistic and although it's not a learning disability itself, I do think it gives me a bit of an extra insight into how everyone is different, and how to build relationships. Even though I’ve not been here that long, I have so many patients who I feel proud of supporting. One of my first patients was non-verbal and hadn’t been smiling. One day, after I’d been to visit a few times she suddenly took hold of my hand and kissed it to show she was happy. And even her sister said ‘she doesn’t do that for me’. I get a bit emotional sometimes as I didn’t realise I’d make such a difference.

Today our Trust marked Remembrance Day with a two-minute silence across our hospital and a service at our chapel at Royal Berkshire Hospital. We’re proud to recognise the service of those who have served in the Armed Force in the past, and those who serve today – as well as all those across the globe affected by conflict.

Happy Occupational Therapy Week to all our incredible Occupational Therapists who do everything they can to support our patients. 💙 Tongai, Kirsty and Holly talk about their roles as Occupational Therapists.

🏆 Congratulations to our Meet PEET team who won the Empowering Communities Through Education for Health and Wellbeing Award 2024 at the Community Awards last week. Our Meet PEET team provide health information, guidance and health checks to local people across our community. Over the past year they provided more than 2,000 health checks to local people. Also, congratulations to Nusrat, one of our Patient Leaders who was awarded for her work with domestic abuse! 🎉

Happy Diwali to our staff and communities celebrating today! We wish you and your families happiness, health and prosperity 🕯 🎆

Meet AK, our Paediatric Consultant 🌟 Hi, I’m Ak – I’m a Paediatric Consultant, and have been at the Trust for the last 13 years. Medicine wasn’t my first choice of career: growing up in Hong Kong, I wanted to be a teacher. However, following some sage advice from my mum who was a teacher herself – I decided to explore a different route. It wasn’t long until I realised paediatric medicine would be a fantastic profession for me as it combined my love of the sciences, interacting with children, and I could still be an educator. After studying at university and completing my training, I joined Médecins San Frontières and worked in Africa for a year. After I returned, I based myself in Oxford and did my second year as a registrar there. I got to know and like the people and paediatrics department, and, most important, they got to know and tolerate me as well. In my last year, I did a teaching course with a consultant which helped me land a locum job at the Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust, which became the permanent position I still hold today, thirteen years later. The paediatrics team here is fantastic – it’s a department where we function well, and we gel and get along well too. I’ve never seen any other hospital with such positive, collaborative working as I have seen here across Paediatrics, the Emergency Department and ICU. My work as a paediatric consultant can be quite varied: the days I’m on the paediatric ward, overseeing patients coming in, can mean making lots of decisions and can be mentally taxing. Whereas the days I’m in neonates is more technical, and physically demanding. And then there's also the flurry of admin work, teaching, clinical governance, rota organising and other work I get involved with. I feel privileged to be a paediatric consultant. Families let you into their inner circle and you’re part of their journey. It does mean I’m often the face that families remember after leaving hospital, leading to being recognised at swimming pools and shopping aisles.

Staff from the Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust, Gemma Peters , Macmillian Cancer Support Chief Executive, and the Mayor of Reading, Cllr @Glenn Dennis came together recently at a special event to recognise the amazing work our volunteer cancer champions do to support their local community. The Berkshire Cancer Centre, based out of the Royal Berkshire Hospital were the first in the country to pilot the idea of champions, and it’s been such a success that working with Macmillan Cancer Support the role is now in place in dozens of locations across the country. Mark Foulkes, Nurse Consultant said, “We have more than 30 members of the public who volunteer their time to provide very human support to members of their community who have been diagnosed with cancer. Rojina, Shaheen, Joyce, Annalisa, DJ and all of our volunteers are remarkable people, and they make such a difference.” The local cancer champions support communities, especially where language may be a barrier, or where awareness of symptoms and the help available to them may be in need of a boost. Joyce Hernandez, who was a nurse at the Royal Berkshire Hospital for 18 years, said, “I get such a lot out of being a cancer champion, it’s something I do alongside my work, and it’s a great feeling to know that I am doing my bit for my community, and that they know I am here if they need me. "Going through cancer diagnosis and treatment is scary. I hope we help to make sure no one feels like they are going through it on their own.”

Meet Makini, our Patient Experience Liaison Nurse and Health Inequalities Programme Manager 🌟 Hello, I’m Makini and I split my time between two roles here at the trust. I spend half my time in our Meet PEET team as a Patient Experience Liaison Nurse, where I go out and deliver Health Checks in the community. And the other half of the week I work in our New Hospital Programme team, Building Berkshire Together as the Health Inequalities Project Manager - looking at the different opportunities to engage with underrepresented communities to make sure that our project serves all of our communities. When I am providing Health Checks with Meet PEET, I travel across West Berkshire and Reading to meet a range of different people. The Health Checks consist of a variety of checks including the patient’s BMI, blood pressure, heart rate, etc. And it is an opportunity to educate those patients about their health. Whilst this role is very much working on the ground, and engaging with different communities, my role in Building Berkshire Together is a little different. I spend a lot of my time writing reports around health inequalities, engaging with partners and local government about goals and future expectations of healthcare. This month is Black History Month, and the theme for this year is about ‘Reclaiming Narratives’, where we shine a light on our stories and history. My mum came to the UK in 1998, from the beautiful island of Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean. She came here for a Nurse position in the old Battle Hospital. After hearing about her experiences when she first came as an international nurse, from dealing with the change of culture, to the differences of healthcare, to also dealing with the weather – she did an amazing job! Because of this, it has given me the drive to improve health inequalities – I am an ethnic minority, I am a woman, I am a carer, and I am a parent. And with this, I feel that I represent the many different communities that I am engaging with on a daily basis and I understand the importance of amplifying their voice. I can’t speak for everyone but one of my main goals is to empower people to thrive not survive.

🚭 We have expanded our support to patients who want to stop smoking. Now, any inpatient, in any ward, at any of our sites will be offered, and able to request support including counseling from a Tobacco Dependency Advisor and the offer of Nictotine Replacement Therapy. We have so far supported more than 150 patients to stop smoking with more than three-quarters taking up the offer of Nicotine Replacement Therapy during their stay, and to take home with them afterwards. 👉 bit.ly/4dN0mml

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Royal Berkshire NHS Foundation Trust