Moments we are proud of in 2022

Here Rowan Wathes, Associate Director of the Excellence Network, shares our version of the 12 days of Christmas.

1. We welcomed new directors! The role of Clinical Director is now shared by Professor Camille Carroll and Professor Richard Walker, plus Dr Jonny Acheson took on the new role of Director of Engagement. Read more about our new directors.
2. The UK Parkinson’s Audit had 506 complete services entries. Find out more about the UK Parkinson's Audit.
3. We added 15 new courses to the Learning Hub, including new bite-sized courses for mental health and pharmacy professionals plus a new learning pathway for pharmacy professionals. Visit the Learning Hub.
4. A focus on better bone health culminated in the completion of a national service improvement project involving 43 services, the launch of an information animation and an ask the experts Q&A session. Read our article on bone health and Parkinson's.
5. A focus on integrated multidisciplinary care saw the launch of our partnership with the Flow Coaching Academy plus the launch of our exciting vision. Read more about the Excellence Network national priority programmes.
6. The time critical medications (Get it on Time) campaign is now firmly on the national agenda, with endorsement from all UK Chief Nursing Officers. We have also had pledges of support from 49% trusts, health board chief executives, senior executives, including all 5 health and social care boards in Northern Ireland.
7. The Excellence Network project grants scheme launched in May with our first grants awarded, watch this space for more information. Read more about our project grants scheme.
8. We continued pump priming Parkinson’s nurses, building on our legacy of funding two-thirds of all Parkinson’s nurse posts across the UK. We also introduced our new pump priming scheme for allied health professional posts. We’ll share more news in the new year. Find out more about our pump priming.
9. Our virtual volunteer education programme reached 1,818 (and counting!) care professionals, which is 20% more than last year. Find out more about our introduction to Parkinson's webinar. Across all our learning programmes, the total number of participants is 18,862.
10. We celebrated getting back to in-person meetings! Including a range of conferences and events throughout the year such as our autumn event and Exercise Hub study day. See all our events and learning for professionals.
11. We joined forces with Parkinson’s UK to raise awareness of the Can’t Wait campaign to tackle the workforce crisis. Find out more about the Can't Wait campaign.
12. Our final entry at number 12 is Parkinson’s UK’s new strategic direction, which includes accelerating progress towards a world class health service for people with Parkinson’s from the point of diagnosis. 

None of these incredible achievements could have been done without the hard work and dedication of health and social care professionals involved in the Network. Without the support from our leads, programmes, groups, hubs and members we would not be able to continue to push for improved services for people with Parkinson’s and their loved ones. 

The challenge is far from over, in 2023, we aim to push even further and we can’t wait to share more details about the business case that we will be developing for point 12 in due course!