Meet the Team

Jennifer Charlewood

Forum Co-Chair

Jen Charlewood is a registered adult trained nurse who has spent most of her nursing career in general practice. She first worked as a treatment room nurse, then a practice nurse. After undertaking further training she qualified as a nurse practitioner and a non-medical prescriber. She spent some time working in Out of Hours work alongside her general practice job. In 2017 she gained her MSc in Clinical Nursing. In 2018 she successfully credentialed as an Advanced Level Nurse Practitioner with the RCN, and was also made a Queen's Nurse for her work in primary care.

Jen has been passionate about working in primary care and advanced practice for many years. She currently chairs the RCN Advanced Nurse Practitioner Forum Steering Committee. She spent three years representing practice nurses in the Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucestershire Clinical Commissioning Group. Currently she works for NHS England South West, representing nurses working in general practice for the region. She still does locum work as an Advanced Nurse Practitioner.

Sharlene Hogan

Forum Co-Chair

MSc Cardiology, RGN, Advanced Clinical Practitioner Cardiovascular Research, Medpace, London UK

Sharlene graduated with a masters in cardiology from Brighton and Sussex University in 2011 and also qualified as a Non-Medical Prescriber in the same year. In 2017 she successfully completed a module at master’s level in 'Innovation and Leadership' at South Bank University. Her nursing career started in 1991 when she trained to become a registered general nurse at London South Bank University and qualified in 1994.

Within the last four years, Sharlene has changed from working within the NHS and is now employed in the Independent sector, joining a pioneering global group of Advanced Nursing Practitioners, in a senior role that is novel in the Clinical Research Organisation industry. Leveraging her clinical and research experience as well as extensive autonomous practice expertise, she has applied these skills to the cardiovascular therapeutic arena. Within this role some of the activities she is involved in include therapeutically focused business development, medical monitoring of research subjects including safety analysis of aggregate data, review of laboratory results as well as reviewing protocol and other research documents, while mentoring and teaching other team members about the scientific background of investigational products or devices.

Before joining the private industry, Sharlene worked at Guy’s & St Thomas NHS Foundation Trust, to develop a new service as the Lead Advanced Nurse Practitioner in Lower Gastrointestinal Surgery. It was a challenging and great opportunity that allowed her to use her cardiac expertise while gaining new skills and knowledge in management, leadership and staff development. The nurse practitioners as well as Sharlene replaced the FY1 doctors and manage the ward patients’ clinical needs.

Cardiovascular nursing has been the focus of her clinical practice for many years and she was a Clinical Nurse Specialist for 12 years with a specific interest in interventional cardiology, arrhythmia nursing, electrophysiological intervention and pacing. While in cardiology she was able to contribute to innovative service development by establishing the first nurse-led cardioversion service, which involved the management of her own caseload of patients’ pre, peri and post cardioversion. Using skills such as consenting, non- medical prescribing, performing the external cardioversion and ensuring the safe discharge and follow up of patients. Teaching and mentoring was also integral to this role as she was responsible for training and competency assessment of doctors to ensure they safely cardioverted patients. Another innovative service that she organised and chaired was the Internal Cardiac Defibrillator (ICD) patient support group. In December 2017 she was interviewed by the BBC to help promote the importance of these groups and demonstrate how they benefit patients.

Teaching and mentoring is integral to her role as a nurse. Sharlene for many years has presented at the HC-UK Conferences with a focus on cardiology and non-medical prescribing sharing her experience and knowledge. In the gastrointestinal service she has provided in-house training for practitioners who require training in abdominal examination. Sharlene is affiliated with the Arrhythmia Alliance and often does patient information workshops to educate the general public about atrial fibrillation, pulse checking, AED defibrillator use and basic life support teaching. She has participated in developing a patient information video, on the use of Direct Oral Anticoagulants, in patients with a diagnosis of atrial fibrillation which received an award of excellence.

Sharlene has been an ANP forum member for at least 4 years and has now taken on a new position as co-chair, in addition to this she has organized as well as hosted the last two RCN ANP conferences, with fantastic speakers from across the four nations as well as global speakers. In the past she has attended RCN Congress, which gave her the opportunity to represent and lend a voice to some of our forum members on important topics that affect ANPs. She remains passionate about patient care, advancing the science of cardiovascular disease management and nursing as a profession and career while challenging and breaking boundaries.

Neal Aplin

MSc, BSc, Dip(HE)
Advanced Clinical Practitioner, Great Western Hospital NHS Foundation Trust

Neal is a dedicated, enthusiastic healthcare professional and experienced autonomous clinical practitioner, uniquely experienced with primary care, secondary care and pre-hospital care experience. He has contributed to research both nationally and internationally and expertise and specialist interests have included implementing point of care testing, developing ACP led services including ANP led abdominal paracentesis and a very enthusiastic clinical simulation trainer!

Neal currently works as an Advanced Clinical Practitioner in Older Persons Care at the Great Western Hospital, Swindon and he lives nearby in Royal Wootton Bassett with his wife and three daughters. 

He qualified as a nurse in 2002 after studying at the University of the West of England, Bristol. He has worked in a variety of clinical areas including CCU, ED, ICU, acute medicine, NHS Walk in Centre, GP surgeries, Out of Hours and Emergency Ambulatory Care. 

Neal continues to study in Bristol, obtaining a BSc Critical Care in 2007, becoming a non-medical prescriber in 2008, and completing an MSc in 2018. Other experience has included serving with the Royal Air Force Reserves and he is a volunteer with St John Ambulance, where he is mainly involved with teaching St John Cadets first aid skills. 

Katie Brown

BA (Hons), MSc, RN(A)
Advanced Nurse Practitioner, Priory Surgery CIC, Holywood & Bangor, Northern Ireland

Katie studied at Liverpool John Moores University, joining the nursing register in January 2005. She returned to her home county of West Yorkshire a few years post-qualification, where she continued her work on surgical speciality wards across the local hospitals. During this time, she enjoyed a secondment into a new obesity service as a Diabetes Specialist Nurse. Wanting to gain broader experience, she moved into intensive care and spent many years within this speciality.

Katie has always had a special interest in diabetes and pursued a CNS role within this speciality, joining an Inpatient Diabetes Specialist Nurse team. She flourished in this role, helping to roll out the “Think Glucose” initiative and introduce it to areas not previously reached by drawing on her non-standard background within a diabetes role of surgical wards and intensive care, to compliment the DSN team. Katie was able to develop various tools aimed at managing diabetes for those on surgical areas and further enhanced her role by gaining her non-medical prescribing qualification.

Further wanting to build on enhancing and advancing her knowledge and skills, she made the difficult decision to leave diabetes nursing to undertake her advanced clinical practice training. Opportunities were available in surgical specialities, to train within urology. Katie was awarded the Bruce Turner Award during her ACP training by the British Association of Urology Nurses and was successfully signed off on performing flexible cystoscopies. She very much enjoyed her work in Urology and developed a pathways for management of patients, to ensure consistency and clear protocols for all clinicians involved in the flexible cystoscopies.

Personal reasons led to Katie and her family moving to Northern Ireland to be close to her in-law family. Owing to training differences, along with the role of the ANP still being relatively new in NI, compared to England, it was difficult for her to obtain an ANP post on moving to NI. This led to a complete change in speciality and move into primary care. The change was a very steep learning curve; however, Katie has solidified her role. She is now in a position to take up additional projects at both practice level and with the RCN ANP Forum.

Adele Parsons

Adele is a Senior Lecturer (Advanced Clinical Practice) who works with the Post Graduate Team in the School of Health and Science at the University of Lincoln. Adele qualified as an RGN in 1996 and in the early years of her career worked in acute and emergency care settings in a number of large teaching hospitals in Oldham, Oxford, Bristol & High Wycombe. In 2001 she became involved in an early pilot for intermediate care planning at the John Radcliffe Hospital in Oxford, this transformational work would later be adopted nationally. Following this role Adele joined the Retained Organs Team at the Radcliffe Infirmary Oxford. The team responded to an Enquiry into retained organs held in NHS Facilities nationally, this work transformed consent processes in the NHS. 

In 2007 Adele moved to Primary Care and General Practice, applying transferable skills and learning new ones related to management of long-term conditions and caring for patients with a broad range of care needs across their lifespan. In the Primary Care setting Adele developed clinically and completed her MSc ACP, as an ACP she was responsible for leading on work including avoiding unplanned admissions and management of all acute on-the-day presentations. Adele also developed management skills and was appointed lead nurse for her local PCN and collaborated with the CCG on their response to the GPN 10PP STP aiming to improve recruitment and retention of GPNs in General Practice, Adele recorded a series of recruitment videos for the RCN. Her work was recognised by Lincolnshire CCG and she was identified as one of 70 rising stars for the NHS at 70 Awards. In 2021 Adele received an award from the Lincolnshire Training Hub recognising her outstanding contribution to General Practice Nursing in Lincolnshire. 

In 2020 Adele was awarded the title of Queens Nurse for her work in General Practice, she continues to be active in the East Midlands Network and has now stepped into the role of Lead Nurse for the East Midlands Queens Nurse Network. Adele’s most recent full-time NHS role was a leadership role working for a Community Trust overseeing Clinical Governance and Quality for GP practices. 

Adele joined the University of Lincoln in December 2021 and leads modules within Advanced Clinical Practice Programmes, she is also Programme Lead for the Professional Nurse Advocate Programme and is an Educational Supervisor for the ePortfolio (Supported) Route. Adele has retained an honorary contract in Primary Care to maintain clinical ACP skills. In June 2023 Adele accepted an NHSE funded secondment returning to Primary Care and the Lincolnshire Training Hub one day a week as an Educational Environment Lead working on placement opportunities for student nurses and AHPs in Primary Care across Lincolnshire.

Coral Rees

Senior Nurse Manager and Advanced Paediatric Nurse Practitioner in Primary Care

Coral has been a qualified children’s nurse for over twenty-one years and within this time has worked for a variety of different NHS trusts both in England and Wales. She has a wide range of experience that has encompassed nursing children and young people with an array of medical and surgical conditions in several acute care settings and has recently been appointed into a senior nurse manager post in primary care, to develop ACP roles, but also continues to have a clinical role as an Advanced Paediatric Nurse Practitioner.

During the first few years of being qualified, Coral developed a keen interest in the extended roles and skills that nurses were starting to perform. An aspiration to be an advanced nurse practitioner was beginning to develop. A change in her personal circumstances led her to move to Wales and within the first year of living here, she was successful appointed into a trainee APNP role within the Children’s Hospital for Wales. During this time, she has completed a BSc in Clinical Practice and MSc in Advanced Practice whilst pushing the boundaries of advanced clinical practice and developing the role further than ever originally anticipated within General Paediatrics. Before moving into primary care, Coral was the lead APNP within the Children’s Hospital for Wales and had developed a framework for advanced practice for Child Health within Cardiff and Vale UHB.

Coral also completed a two-year part-time secondment as an Associate Lecturer at Cardiff University from 2014-2016 and achieved her PGCE in healthcare and has been registered as a nurse teacher with the NMC since 2017.

Coral is passionate about advanced practice and is looking forward to working with the ANP forum steering group.

Josie Tuck

Consultant Nurse and Trainee Multi-Professional Approved Clinician, Dorset Healthcare University NHS Foundation Trust

Josie is a registered mental health nurse who has worked across acute, inpatient and community mental health settings since completing her initial registration in 2006. She provides high quality care for people in distress who access mental health services, and incorporates psychological and recovery approaches into her daily practice. She trained as a Dialectical Behaviour Therapist in 2009 and went on to complete her MSc in Advanced Clinical Practice in 2018. After completing the ACP programme, Josie spent time in general practice providing mental health care to people in the local population in order to fill the gap between primary and secondary services. She has continued to advance her practice and after returning to secondary mental health services has taken on a more active role in strategic planning, specifically for the ACP workforce through the creation of an Advanced Practice Framework for Dorset Healthcare which was successfully launched in 2023.

In 2022, Josie was successfully recruited to a development programme for Consultant Practitioners funded by Health Education England (now NHS England). This training involves a bespoke qualification in Mental Health Law and support to complete the portfolio route to gain approval as a Multi Professional Approved Clinician (MPAC). This approval allows MPAC’s to assume the role of Responsible Clinician under the Mental Health Act for those liable to detention under the Act, a role more traditionally taken on by Consultant psychiatrists. Josie is currently working on an acute inpatient ward, alongside a Consultant Psychiatrist, leading on care provision for male service users over the age of 18 years and enjoying the challenge of establishing new ways of working within healthcare.

Alongside her clinical work, Josie holds a senior lecturer position at Bournemouth University. She enjoys teaching a variety of health professionals through post registration courses focusing on supporting people with mental health needs across physical care services.