Leading with Hearts and Minds

Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital in Drogheda became the second hospital in Ireland to achieve Pathway to Excellence — the international accreditation recognising nursing excellence, workplace culture, and shared decision-making.

In this episode, Director of Nursing Adrian Cleary and Assistant Director of Nursing Áine Davern describe how the pursuit of Pathway helped their teams move beyond the fatigue of the pandemic and build something lasting — from a council structure Adrian calls "a greenhouse for new ideas" to a wellbeing programme that has changed the face of staff support at Lourdes. They talk about what it takes to lift nursing leadership out of the daily operational role and back to the strategic responsibilities their colleagues need from them.

Four members of the nursing team — Cathy Clarke, Bijily Joseph, Nena Evalaroza, and Aoife O'Neil — share their own experiences of the journey, from the ward councils that gave frontline nurses a voice, to the day the hospital received the news.

Credits:

Adrian Cleary, Director of Nursing, Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital

Áine Davern, Assistant Director of Nursing, Our Lady of Lourdes Hospital

Cathy Clarke, RANP

Bijily Joseph, CNM2

Nena Evalaroza, CNM2

Aoife O'Neil, Clinical Skills Facilitator

Interviewer: Marie Kilduff, National Clinical Leadership Centre for Nursing and Midwifery

St James's Hospital became the first hospital in Ireland to achieve Pathway to Excellence — an international accreditation from the American Nurses Credentialing Centre that recognises a genuinely positive working environment for nurses.

This episode is the story of how a nursing team got it over the line, in their own words.

Marie Kilduff talks to some of the people behind the success — from the Director of Nursing to the staff nurses on the wards — about what Pathway actually asks of a hospital, why the staff survey was the hardest part, and how link-nurse meetings, ward competitions and even a viral video helped bring more than 2,000 nurses with them. It's a candid conversation about culture, voice and what respect looks like in daily practice — including the moments when the effort dipped, and the day, right before St Patrick's weekend, when they finally heard the result.

In this episode:

What Pathway to Excellence is, and the six standards behind it
The submission, and the staff survey that had to clear a high bar
Making it stick: link nurses, competitions and the ward trolleys
The honest part — when momentum dipped, and what carried them through
The nursing councils, and what an equal voice looks like in practice
Hearing the result, and what changes once you have it

Featuring from St James's Hospital:

Sharon Slattery, Director of Nursing
Charlotte Stuart, Assistant Director of Nursing
Marian Broderick, CNM 3
Anne-Marie McKenna, CNM 2
Ajin Ragavan Selvi, CNM 2
Maria Begley, Staff Nurse

Credits:

Presented by Marie Kilduff

Guests: Sharon Slattery, Charlotte Stuart, Marian Broderick, Anne-Marie McKenna, Ajin Ragavan Selvi and Maria Begley, St James's Hospital

Petrina Donnelly has spent thirty-three years in nursing, from a hospital ward in Craigavon to one of Ireland's new Regional Director of Nursing and Midwifery posts. Ask how she got there, and the answer is rarely a plan — it's a series of people who encouraged her to take the next step before she felt ready. She talks to Marie Kilduff about the mentors who shaped her, what it's actually like to lead a brand-new region with no map and no handover, her vision for a genuinely integrated health service, and how a senior leader keeps going without running herself down, with a returning contribution from her former colleague Paul Gallagher, recorded before his retirement.

What does it take to nurse someone whose privacy is gone, whose environment magnifies every symptom, and whose relationship with the health system has, until now, been broken or absent? Enda Kelly has spent more than three decades finding out.

Enda is National Nurse Manager for Operations with the Irish Prison Service, a Fellow of the Faculty of Nursing and Midwifery at the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, and is currently a year into a PhD on the intersection of law, ethics, and prison regulation. In this conversation, he speaks to Marie Kilduff about what prison nursing actually involves — clinically, ethically, and personally — and about the leadership practice he's built over a career.

What does it take to provide therapy to the people who provide care? Marie Kilduff speaks with Morgan Lucey, Head of National Employee Assistance Services in the HSE's Workplace Health and Wellbeing Unit, about the service that supports more than 100,000 healthcare staff across Ireland.

IF YOU NEED SUPPORT.

For HSE staff: Phone (national line): 0818 327 327

Email (referrals): eap.referral@hse.ie

Online resource hub:

www.inspiresupporthub.org/HSE-EAPandME

Website: www.hse.ie/EAPandME

Credits: Leading with Hearts and Minds is hosted by Marie Kilduff.