Speakers

Heather is a Patient Moving & Handling Service Lead for the Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust. With over 37 years' experience in health and social care, she has dedicated her career to improving moving and handling practice, staff safety, and patient outcomes. She began working for the Local Authority within the Moving and Handling Forum before spending 10 years working across both the Local Authority and the Royal Wolverhampton NHS Trust as a Manual Handling and Health & Safety practitioner through a Service Level Agreement. She has been in her current position for 10 years and is proud to lead a team of four dedicated Patient Moving and Handling (PMH) professionals who support staff training and complex patient handling situations across the Trust. Heather oversees training programmes, and service improvement projects. She has also introduced a complex patient referral alert system, enabling staff to refer patients with moving and handling challenges directly to the PMH team for timely assessment and support. Having completed a PG Cert in Human Factors and Ergonomics for Patient Safety, Heather is passionate about applying human factors principles to influence behaviours, improve auditing processes, and maintain consistent best practice across the Trust, while promoting the right equipment for the right patient at the right time.