ROSWYN HAKESLEY-BROWN CBE

MPhil BA RN RM RNT DN (Lond) Cert Ed (B'ham)

Roswyn is a trained nurse and midwife. For several years she worked as a ward sister at the Royal Hospital in Wolverhampton. She later qualified as a teacher and worked as a nurse tutor at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham. She carried out post-graduate research at the University of Warwick on individualised care and was awarded an MPhil. She later published her first book on her findings. She has continued to publish widely (including the first book on portfolio development for nurses) and is a member of the Society of Authors, a commissioning editor and member of several editorial boards. Between 1997-2006, she was a non-executive director on the board of the ExtraCare Charitable Trust (care of older people). She was part of the management delegation tasked with visiting the USA to examine the concept of retirement villages. Consequently, ExtraCare has developed 6 of these highly innovative facilities and is in the process of developing 4 more.

Until 1996 she worked as a Principal Lecturer at the University of Central England where she was responsible for leading the development of the first post-registration degree for nurses and midwives in the West Midlands and the first Masters' programme in the UK for advanced practice. In 1995 she was awarded a Florence Nightingale Scholarship, which enabled her to visit four universities in the USA over a period of two months to examine the concept of advanced practice.

Since 1997, Roswyn has worked independently mainly as a consultant in healthcare education and researcher. One of her early projects was to cascade the use of evidence-based healthcare on an interdisciplinary basis to doctors, nurses and allied health professionals across the West Midlands on behalf of the then Regional Health Authority. She has also undertaken research to evaluate the preparation of primary care staff for engaging with the public health agenda and a UK wide evaluation of the Royal College of Nursings branch structure.

In 2000, Roswyn was elected President of the Royal College of Nursing (RCN). While in office she established up the Presidential Education Task Force to set the RCNs strategic direction for nurse education in the UK over the next ten years. During her term of office she delivered keynote addresses, published widely, chaired significant professional events and travelled extensively both nationally and internationally.

As a former President, Roswyn has been heavily involved with the integration of refugee healthcare professionals (RHPs) into the health and social care workforce in the UK. She was a member of the Department of Health (DH) Steering Group for RHPs. She also chaired the UK wide Task Force for Refugee Nurses. She wrote the first guide for refugee nurses and midwives for the DH. During 2006 she led the Refugee Nurses Project in the School of Care Sciences at the University of Glamorgan.

She is currently Chair of the Building Bridges National Steering Group for the Integration of Refugee Healthcare Professionals, in addition to the Regional Committee in the West Midlands. She has recently developed the smoking cessation syllabus for trainee general practitioners for the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP). She is developing a Department of Health funded smoking-cessation teaching package for inclusion in pre-registration nursing and midwifery programmes. She became a Trustee of the Patients Association in 2007. She was awarded a CBE in the 2007 New Years Honours for services to health care.