Academy of Medical Royal Colleges releases “Multi-professional team-working - The experience and lessons from COVID-19”

The Academy of Medical Royal Colleges (AoMRC) has just released a new report on "Multi-professional team-working – The experience and lessons from COVID-19" with excellent contribution from our member Siobhan Kirk, Service Improvement Lead for Sexual & Reproductive Health and Associate Specialist in Gynaecology at Belfast HSC Trust, Northern Ireland.

Siobhan provided a case study for the report on Providing access to early medical Abortion in Northern Ireland, which details how when the pandemic began, the NI Abortion and Contraception Taskgroup (NIACT) – a multidisciplinary and multi-agency group- worked together to set up a temporary, early medical abortion service to help patients who weren’t able to travel to access provision as they might have before the pandemic.

Siobhan developed the abortion service at Belfast HSC Trust, which as allowed by Northern Irish legislation, is a nurse-led service. One of these nurses, Nicola Bailey, a sexual and reproductive health services manager at Belfast HSC Trust and FSRH member, recently won the Royal College of Nursing Nurse of the year 2021 award for her work in setting up the service. Judges lauded her passion for promoting women’s health, and bravery for continuing despite protests and political resistance.

You can read the full report here.