Congratulations to our six newly-qualified Advanced Clinical Practitioners (ACPs), all from nursing and physiotherapy backgrounds, who have successfully completed a three-year Apprenticeship Master’s Degree in Advanced Practice. 

Rebecca Parker, Matt Almond-Beech, Katie Murray, Rachel Drydon, Beverly Jessop and Claire Manderson join an established team of ACPs working across the Frailty and Urgent Community Response (UCR) team in Calderdale, who provide comprehensive personalised care for our frail, older population. It's now a truly dynamic multidisciplinary team (MDT) of varied backgrounds, who rotate across both acute and community divisions and embrace the CHFT values to provide high quality care closer to home when possible, collaborating with many community teams.

Katie said: "When I originally joined the frailty team, I didn't know what an ACP was. I worked alongside ACPs in the team and wondered if I could become one myself. After discovering physiotherapists were eligible to become ACPs, I was keen to undertake this training within frailty, as I knew I could have a positive impact in the quality of care we provide for our frail population. Having now qualified, I look forward to settling into my new role and continuing my professional development. I would like to say a huge thanks to all the ACPs, medical teams, frailty, SDEC and UCR teams, without them I most certainly wouldn't be where I am today!"

Rebecca said: "I was encouraged by the fabulous frailty team to further my nursing career. I wanted to expand my knowledge and clinical skills to be able to provide truly holistic care to the frail elderly patients under our care. I have really enjoyed my training, it has been tough, but I have learned so much and I have had excellent support from ACPs, geriatricians, and emergency teams which I will forever be grateful for. I am excited to develop in my role working across frailty and UCR to provide care closer to home, often avoiding unnecessary hospital admissions, and supporting patients at home with community partners."

Claire said: "The last three years have been really challenging. This training is not for the faint-hearted! But I have felt overwhelming support from the geriatricians and the ACPs in the frailty team, without whom I could not have made it to the finish line. The academic requirement of this apprenticeship is very demanding, and so to balance that alongside the work-based clinical learning would not have been possible without a robust plan for support and supervision which I am really grateful for.

"I am excited that, like me, three of the newly qualified ACPs are also physiotherapists - demonstrating the real value of a broad MDT when working with frail patients with complex health needs."