Sophie Godfrey-Lowe

I work as a staff nurse on Ward 83. Our ward mainly specialises in children on long-term ventilation. However, more recently, Our ward has been taking care of children who have a range of medical needs such as general medical complexities, acquired brain injuries and finally, children who have neurodegenerative conditions.

Initially I began working on Ward 83 as a support worker. Following that, I took my Learning Disability Nursing degree and started working as a staff nurse. I was aware that many of the children with complex needs and acquired brain injury who were being treated on the ward had a co-occurring learning disability. It has been a focus for me since qualifying to raise awareness and develop adaptations on the ward to allow it to be more accessible to children with learning disabilities or autism.

having delivered ward based training on learning disability and autism for the last 12 months, the Fellowship will, I feel, enable me to feel mor confident delivering training on a trust-wide level. My end goal, following the completion of the fellowship, is to assist in creating a more inclusive workforce culture of making reasonable adjustments to standard practices, also to be part of normalising the use of alternative communication methods and to be a point of contact for staff if they have questions regarding patients with learning disabilities or autism.