A DAY OF FIRSTS FOR HEALTH AND SOCIAL CARE NORTHERN IRELAND
On 2nd October 2025 fifteen finalists from across Northern Ireland attended the Picker Experience Network (PEN) National Awards held at University of Birmingham. Their mission was to demonstrate how our services in Northern Ireland work in partnership with service user, families and carers to improve upon experience. The national awards recognise outstanding excellence in patient experience. They celebrate projects, teams, individuals, and initiatives that have made exceptional contributions to care, engagement, service delivery, and wellbeing from the perspective of patients, carers, families, and staff (PEN Awards – Picker Experience Network). With finalists from across the United Kingdom our colleagues from Northern Ireland excelled in their categories bring home four winners and four runner up across the 18 categories.
It was a day of firsts for Health and Social Care Northern Ireland with Southern Health and Social Care Trust trailblazing as overall PEN 25 winners with their project “Seasons of Life”. Led by Dr Sinead Hannan and Michelle Mooney this project aims to help young people think about grief and loss and provide ways to cope with their feelings and experiences. The programme was co-designed with children, families and professionals ensuring it was not only clinically informed but emotionally resonant and accessible. After the event Ruth Evans, founder of PEN, reflected,
“Congratulations to Southern Health and Social Care Trust on this fantastic achievement. The Awards are always a special occasion and today highlighted exactly why they matter. They demonstrate what is possible when care is centred around people – their needs, their voices, and their preferences. Since Picker acquired PEN, we’ve been committed to growing this platform so that person centred care can be celebrated and shared globally. This year’s winner inspired us all.”
(Winners, Dr Sinead Hannan and Michelle Mooney (SHSCT) with Chief Executive of Picker, Chris Graham)
This year we also celebrated our first ever finalists from University of Ulster in the category “Student Patient Experience Advocate of Tomorrow”. We were delighted to celebrate with our undergraduate medical students (Magee College, UU) who were awarded runner up for their work on “Improving syringe drivers and anticipatory medications in primary care” and an overall winner for “Teddy Bear Hospital”. As reflected on the day, the student category reflects the future for our Health and Social Care system and reinforces our student’s commitment to improving experiences for our patients.
(Winner Christian Bennison, Year 3 Medical Student, University of Ulster with Picker representative, Louise Blunt)
The celebrations for Northern Ireland extended beyond our Trust services. Patient Client Council were recognised as winners in the category Team of the Year for the work of senior practitioners in developing an advocacy service to marginalised and underserved communities across Northern Ireland. In the category of Patient Contribution, The Independent Neurology Liaison Group were winners for their compelling high-integrity model of patient centred reform – bringing together individuals harmed by the system to help rebuild it. As a reform partner this group worked with leaders in Department of Health to bring about meaningful change in the work of Patient Safety, Governance reform, complaints model and Departmental guidance on openness and candour.
(Winners and group representatives, Tom Ford and Brian O’Hagan with Cheryl Tackie, Chair of PEN & Lived Experience Partner)
The event really harnessed the importance of celebrating and learning from excellence. You can read more about all our finalists and our worthy winner through the Book of Best practice PEN 2025 – Picker Experience Network; The awards give us a glimpse of what can be achieved when we take the courage to work in partnership with our service users, carers and their families. Each finalist challenges us to consider deeper how we do this with meaningful impact to further improve our Health and Social Care system. As reflected by the keynote speaker, Freya Williams
“Enhancing patient experience is central to everything we do… we must always aim to provide the best possible care for those who place their trust in us”
Linda Craig, Member of Judging panel for PEN,
Regional Lead for Experience and Involvement (PHA)
