Child Health Award for psychology lecturer
Glasgow Caledonian University Lecturer in Applied Psychology Dr Liza Morton was part of an expert team who scooped the Child Health Award at the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) Nursing Awards last week.
For the past four years, Dr Morton has been involved in the iSUPPORT international team, which is committed to improving medical care for children. She is delighted the team have received such recognition for their hard work from the RCN.
Dr Morton (bottom-right in the image) became part of iSUPPORT after team lead and children's nurse Professor Lucy Bray invited her to work as an external collaborator with the team, based at Edge Hill University, developing standards on the clinical holding of children for medical procedures.
iSUPPORT works with children, parents and healthcare professionals to ensure a child's emotional and psychological wellbeing is central to all key decisions about care and procedures.
The team represents a collaboration between 50 multidisciplinary professionals from 16 countries, inspired by Katie Dixon, who experienced multiple traumatic procedures as a child and has since been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder.
The team developed a set of standards that outline what good procedural practice looks like, designed to minimise anxiety and stress experienced by children when undergoing procedures.
Professor Bray said: "We are very proud that this work is being recognised, it is an amazing way to say thank you to all the children, young people and parents who have been such an important part of the project, especially Katie who started the team in the first place,' she said. 'The team are passionate about changing practice and this award helps showcase the difference that nurses can make."
Last year Dr Morton, a Chartered Counselling Psychologist and lecturer in the School of Health and Life Sciences (SHLS) Department of Psychology, co-wrote a book entitled Healing Hearts and Minds: A holistic approach to coping well with congenital heart disease about her own experiences living with a lifelong heart condition.
In her book published last year, she tells how she coped with the emotional and physical trauma associated with being born with congenital heart disease.
Dr Morton, who is also a researcher in the SHLS Research Centre for Health (ReaCH), explained the background to how she became involved in iSUPPORT: "Lucy and I connected on social media through our shared passion for improving the hospital experience for children.
"I came across her work on clinical holding of children during medical procedures which found that 81% of medical professionals report children being forcefully held for medical procedures 'frequently' or 'very frequently' to get the procedure done quickly despite potentially causing them to become scared of having future procedures and contributing to post-traumatic stress (Bray et al 2018).
"Her work is relevant to my own research, publication, healthcare activism and my teaching at Glasgow Caledonian on challenging disempowering aspects of medical care to mitigate medical trauma.
"Lucy is interested in my work on promoting a psychologically informed approach to healthcare provision and my extensive childhood experience of medical procedures as someone living with a congenital heart condition dependent on pioneering cardiac care from infancy.
"In 2019, Lucy invited me to work as an external collaborator with the team at Edge Hill University, developing standards on the clinical holding of children for medical procedures.
"Professor Bray has been an inspirational leader, bringing together what quickly evolved into iSUPPORT an international team committed to improving medical care for children. Over the coming months we met online to develop, comment on and revise the rights-based standards and we were all collectively delighted to receive this award from the RCN."