Dame Eileen Sills, (born June 1962) is the Chief Nurse, Director of Patient Experience and Infection Control and a member of the board at
Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust
Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust is an NHS foundation trust of the English National Health Service, one of the prestigious Shelford Group. It runs Guy's Hospital in London Bridge, St Thomas' Hospital in Waterloo, Evelina London Child ...
. She was the first
Freedom to Speak Up National Guardian.
Career
Before taking up the National Guardian post, she was additionally senior nursing advisor at the
Nursing and Midwifery Council
The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) is the regulator for nursing and midwifery professions in the UK. The NMC maintains a register of all nurses, midwives and specialist community public health nurses and nursing associates eligible to pra ...
and chair of the nurses group for the
Shelford Group
The Shelford Group is a collaboration of ten of the largest teaching and research NHS hospital trusts in England. The ten members collectively employ over 170,000 people, account for over £17 billion of the NHS budget and for almost two thirds o ...
of leading NHS
foundation trusts.
She was previously the Clinical Director of London's Strategic Clinical Network for Dementia.
She qualified as a nurse in 1983 at
Stepping Hill Hospital
Stepping Hill Hospital is in Stockport, Greater Manchester, England. It is managed by Stockport NHS Foundation Trust.
History
The facility was established as the Stepping Hill Poor Law Hospital in 1905. It became a military hospital during the ...
. She moved from there to work in A&E at
North Middlesex Hospital as a Sister and then became director of nursing at the
Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital and then
Whipps Cross Hospital. She chaired the London Standing Conference group on Homelessness. She trained medical practitioners to be "dementia friends".
Sills was appointed Chief Nurse at Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust in 2005. She sat on the Prime Minister's independent commission into nursing and midwifery that published the
Front Line Care (Report) in 2010.
Honours
She was elevated to Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in the
2015 New Year Honours having been appointed a CBE in the
2004 New Year Honours. She was awarded Fellowship of the
Royal College of Nursing
The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) is a registered trade union and professional body in the United Kingdom for those in the profession of nursing. It was founded in 1916 as the College of Nursing, receiving its royal charter in 1928. Queen Eliz ...
in 2012.
Controversy
In January 2016, she was appointed as the first Freedom to Speak Up National Guardian for the NHS.
Some reactions were hostile as she would be working two days a week while retaining her three roles at the Guy's and St Thomas' NHS Foundation Trust for the other three days. Activist
Julie Bailey described her appointment as "disappointing".
Roy Lilley described her appointment as "an affront" and "waving two fingers".
[
On 4 March 2016, she resigned from her National Guardian post as she felt unable to do it justice together with her other responsibilities.]
References
Links
Profile
checkcompany.co.uk; accessed 16 June 2016.
{{DEFAULTSORT:Sills, Eileen
1962 births
Dames Commander of the Order of the British Empire
Administrators in the National Health Service
English nurses
Place of birth missing (living people)
Date of birth missing (living people)
People from Stoke Newington
Living people
Fellows of the Royal College of Nursing
British nurses