Cardiff & Vale Health Charity is pleased to announce Stuart Cunningham, Admin Manager at the Clinical Research Group, has been crowned Health Hero for January.
Stuart works within a large research team which delivers haematology cancer trials to patients. The department is a tertiary referral centre and accepts referrals for study across a large geographical region. Data compliance and regulation are of paramount importance within clinical trials and Stuart has implemented many electronic systems within the group that ensures the data entry and compliance has improved, and reports the clinical trial activity to Health and Care Research Wales.
Stuart has been described as having transformed their area with the implementation of many new systems.
Emma Williams, Haematology Trials Unit Manager and Clinical Advisor to Blood Cancer UK said, “We work on over 65 trials within the department – one of the largest within the Health Board. He has set up an amendment tracker to safely ensure that the research team and the consultants have an automatic email every month to let them know what the most recent amendment was to the study protocol and where it is sitting within the R&D process.
“The email also lets the team know how many patients have been recruited and if we are working to the time and target set out within the contract. Any issues are easily and quickly identified and a discussion can be had between myself and relevant PI to easily iron out any issues sooner rather than later. Study Sponsors are also able to have these alerts and then can also approach us if there are any inconsistencies between the contracted arrangements and what may be happening currently.”
More recently, Stuart has opened up an electronic system to the nursing staff that updates as soon as each nurse has recruited a patient so that they are accurately monitoring activity. The system is an electric form that automatically links to their diaries and accurately informs of which patient is coming and what is needed for that visit, such as bloods, quality of life assessments, and courier booking for outside sampling to be sent off.
Emma continued, “Stuart is very modest about what he does, and would never put himself forward for such a nomination, however, at our team meeting I raised all of the work that he has done and all staff unanimously agreed that we should highlight how transformative his work has been. Thank you, Stuart.”
Stuart will be Health Hero for the month of January and will receive a treat from sponsors Park Plaza Cardiff. He is delighted with the award nomination.
The Health Hero Award is supported by Cardiff & Vale Health Charity and Park Plaza Cardiff.
If you feel you know someone who has worked tirelessly to help a colleague or patient in healthcare settings throughout Cardiff and Vale University Health Board and deserves recognition then let us know about them.
To nominate your Health Hero: Email: fundraising.cav@wales.nhs.uk
Nominations must include: Your name, contact details, the nominee’s name and role, plus some words explaining exactly why you think they deserve to be crowned Health Hero.
If you have already nominated someone, they will be automatically entered into the next round for consideration for the award.
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