Dr Nicola Abraham - NHS staff wellbeing project wins 'Imperial's Got Talent!'
Today we are speaking with Dr Nicola Abraham, Senior Lecturer, Applied Theatre Practices at Central (Student Knowledge Exchange Principal Investigator/Project Lead) about her work on secondment with the Dementia Care Team within Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust.
She tells us about working with Victoria Ruddock, Dementia Specialist Healthcare Support Worker, Dementia Care Team, Project Co-Lead, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust; and Rachel Hudspith, Activities Coordinator, Dementia Care Team, Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust.
Their second NHS staff wellbeing project was a collaborative project to create the original song ‘Have a Little Faith’ which has won the inaugural ‘Imperial’s Got Talent!’ competition.
Tell us more about your work with Central
Usually, I’m a Senior Lecturer in Applied Theatre Practice working on the Drama, Applied Theatre and Education, BA and Applied Theatre, MA courses at Central. At the moment, I’m seconded to the Dementia Care Team within Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust working in partnership with Consultant Nurse, Jo James, and my project co-lead Victoria Ruddock and supporting co-lead Rachel Hudspith, who is also alumni from the Applied Theatre, MA. We are all working together on a project funded by Research England and the Office for Students to create digital applied theatre projects offering placements to undergraduate and postgraduate applied theatre students to support patients living with dementia and inspirational NHS staff in acute hospital settings and healthcare/activity coordinating staff in care homes.
How did your secondment with the NHS come about?
Jo James and I have worked together on a number of in-person projects across three hospitals since 2016, but we noticed that we only had capacity to offer one project per term and were determined to increase our offer and expand our partnership working together. Just before Christmas in December 2019, we applied for Student Knowledge Exchange funding to quadruple our projects and placements for students to support patients. We won the funding just as we entered the first UK lockdown in 2020 but decided the need for the project had only increased. With my project co-lead, Victoria (Vic), I translated all of our in-person project models into digital forms and tested the technology we had available with a successful pilot in August/September 2020. We now have six ongoing projects and have just completed our second NHS staff wellbeing project, which we are excited to share with you today.
What has been your favourite part of working with the NHS?
My favourite part of working in the NHS is the feeling of learning and advancing my practice and consequently the practice of our students every day, of having the privilege of working with patients living with dementia and undergoing dialysis across three hospitals, and collaborating with the incredible NHS staff I am fortunate to work with. Jo and Vic have taught me a lot about dementia, delirium and navigating the complexity of NHS contexts, which have a completely different way of working to our field. Finding points of connection is part of our task and has been fascinating as a process of ongoing development for our collaborative project.
What has surprised you the most about this experience?
I’m always surprised by how much we learn and develop with every workshop we experience. Vic is learning all the projects we are developing and has also been facilitating in-role for our intergenerational projects with a local international community school who work with us to connect to patients. I’m learning about how individually dementia is experienced and how we can bring out someone’s inner artist and ensure patients participate as active citizens in our work. I’m always amazed at how responsive our wonderful students are too as practitioners who are always ready to try new approaches to ensure we are embodying inclusive, person-centred practice at the core of everything we do.
How did you come up with the idea to write ‘Have a Little Faith’ and can you tell us a bit more about it?
It all started when Vic was working with the fabulous staff on Lewis Loyd ward, a medicine for the elderly ward in St Mary’s Hospital, to support a patient who was rather unsettled. Vic built a special relationship with the patient because of their shared love of animals and both having a beloved dog at home, which advanced their engagement with each other and enabled them to build a connection. At the same time, I was working with Vic to put together our projects and we were due to test out recording equipment, I’d been writing songs with my Dad, Dave Abraham, over lockdown as a wellbeing activity and he had sent me a backing track. Vic had also related her story of working with this lovely lady to me, and I wrote up a representation of their connection in lyrics, which Vic kindly agreed to sing – unbeknownst to me at the time, Vic has sung for large choirs inspired by her Dad for a number of years previously and has a beautiful voice, and that was the beginning of the journey of this song. The final song was then shown to the patient who was overwhelmed that someone had created this for her.
Lewis Loyd and Dementia Care Team: Imperial’s Got Talent Entry 2021
Tell us more about ‘Imperial’s Got Talent!’
The past 18 months have taken their toll on many of us, and those at the front lines have had to support patients, save lives and experienced a lot of challenges whilst carrying out incredible care. We wanted to do something for NHS staff to say thank you, so we suggested creating a collaborative music video with staff on the ward where Vic had originally met our inspirational patient. The Lewis Loyd ward staff agreed, and everyone from catering staff, Healthcare Support Workers, Staff Nurses and Matrons took part to create a community music video to ‘Have a little faith’ that we entered to ‘Imperial’s Got Talent!’ 2021. We found out we were shortlisted from the 40 entries and then Sir Elton John and David Furnish announced that we had won on Friday last week as part of this year’s Gratitude festival that Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust have created.
What does winning ‘Imperial’s Got Talent!’ mean to you?
For us, it is recognition of our relationship between the Dementia Care Team and Lewis Loyd ward staff, it is also an important moment of excitement for those who took part and very positive event to celebrate the ongoing dedication of the NHS staff who have worked tirelessly throughout the pandemic. It is additionally a moment of pause to think about what can be achieved when we work together and a moment of plotting what we can do next – the sky is indeed the limit!
What was the most exciting moment about the virtual ceremony?
Well… we were all called together on Thursday afternoon, and asked to gather as many people as possible to attend on various devices for the announcement of the results, which were filmed to add into the final edit of the show to be streamed the following day (Friday 9 July 2021). Vic and I were working from home that day together preparing vlog tutorials for our various projects, and Rachel and I had prepared our Teams apps on several tablets to go the ward for the live announcement which we had to keep under wraps until the end of the ceremony on Friday evening. I think it’s fair to say that we were nervous in anticipation of the results, even though of course, it’s the process that was most important in making this piece of work together. Then the Chief Executive for Imperial, Professor Tim Orchard, announced that Sir Elton John and David Furnish were going to share the results and our act was declared the winner! For me, it was the reaction of the ward staff, we were of course over the moon, but to see their response was really moving!
Watch Sir Elton John and David Furnish announce the winners of ‘Imperial’s Got Talent!’ at the virtual ceremony on 9 July 2021. (The announcement begins at 1.03.43.)
What’s next for you and the team?
We are in the process of setting up our next lot of summer term student placements to take place in August, and autumn term, and also planning more NHS staff wellbeing projects for the later part of the year – I’ll make sure we update you on what we have in store! We’ve done a senior NHS staff panto, won ‘Imperial’s Got Talent!’ … so who knows what we can do next!
Comments from the Lewis Loyd ward staff who took part in the project:
Student Nurse: “I’m very happy that I was one of the participants! It’s really nice to work with you and learn sign language, thank you for giving us opportunity.”
Jessica Fernades (LLO ward manager): “We are privileged to be part of the video and it’s amazing that we were chosen, and it’s been done with the memory of our patient - we are very thankful that we are part of this video.”
Charlene Willoughby (Ward Clerk): “My view of the video is very emotional and watching the video and then the fact that we won, it touched my heart, we did a good job!”
Janet Surplus (Staff Nurse LLO): “I feel very privileged to be part of the signing and singing competition and it was a really nice experience.”
Justina Madunagum (HCA): “I was very pleased that we took part in sign and the singing competition and I’m so proud that we won, and the patients got involved with the whole thing, thank you!”
Romena Ahmed (HCA): “This video represents us as a team, team Lewis Loyd!”
Vinuja Rasiah Jeyaratnam (Student Nurse): “I’m very grateful, thank you for the opportunity as a Student Nurse I really enjoyed the song, I am really grateful thank you.”
Joina Sabu (Student Nurse): “This was an amazing opportunity which we got to be part of as Student Nurses. This will be a good memory from my placement. Thank you Lewis Loyd ward!”
Jamilah Ahmed (Student Nurse): “This was a great experience, I had a lot of fun, and I will always remember this and have the video to look back on.”
Victoria Ruddock (HCA – Project Co-Lead): “In the back of my mind I desperately wanted to win, but I never stopped to think about how I’d feel if we actually did. I was so overwhelmed at winning and being given the chance to be a part of this competition but with all the pressure of working during the pandemic it just felt like a chance to unwind and enjoy the process of making music, and just to think it all started off with doing something nice for our patient in Lewis Loyd ward - she inspired us to make this amazing song, which is dedicated to her. I didn’t think for one minute that Sir Elton John would be the judge and hear me sing! That’s an experience I’ll never forget, I have learnt so much spending this time with Nicky and I’m looking forward to more projects in the future, I can’t thank her enough for ‘Having a Little Faith’ in me.”
You can follow Dr Nicola Abraham on Twitter (@DrNickyA) to find out more about her work and research including her ongoing projects with Victoria Ruddock, Rachel Hudspith and Jessica Fernades at Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust.
Read an interview with Dr Nicola Abraham and Victoria Ruddock about the release of the ‘Have a Little Faith’ music video from October 2020.