Meet the Team
Jacqueline Johnstone
Forum Chair
Biography coming soon
Sam Palmer
Sam is a newly registered nurse, working on a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit.
Coming from 12 years living in Norfolk working in various non-registered care roles, Sam went off to study BSc (Hons) in Children’s Nursing as a mature student in London, at the very beginning of the pandemic.
Flash forward 3 (and a bit) years Sam is now embarking on new adventures and a lifelong dream of working in the Southwest in NICU, where she is excited to grow and learn as she navigates the NRN journey.
Sam believes that the CYP specialist care forum has a diverse membership and she hopes to represent her colleagues and peers in early career nursing within CYP specialist care.
Being passionate about how we can improve the space for our patients, families and our peers to have their voices heard, throughout my studies, Sam really hopse to build on this professionally and within the forum.
Sam is here to engage with as many of the forum, and potential members, as possible. She would like to help create space, alongside the committee team, to highlight your voices and that of specialist CYP nursing. Sam truly believes: together we really can improve outcomes for our patients and for ourselves, whilst creating and fostering an evolving, nurturing environment that others want to join.
X (Twitter): @SamChumba3
Emma Thistlethwayte
Biography coming soonContact
Carli Whittaker: Professional Lead
Carli has been appointed as the Head of Nursing Practice - Children and Young People (CYP) in the Nursing Practice Academy of the RCN Institute of Excellence.
Being Australian and having completed her Nursing Degree at Sydney University, Carli has utilised nursing to travel and gain extensive international clinical experience in a variety of fields before finding her passion in Children’s Nursing and Paediatric Critical Care (PCC).
Carli completed her MSc Advanced Nursing in 2012 in comparing educational approaches in achieving clinical competence. Carli is currently undertaking her PhD in the exploration of children’s nurses and the retention challenges faced. Carli was the PCC Educator for 11 years at Nottingham Children’s Hospital prior to her role as Director of Clinical Skills (Associate Professor) in the School of Health Sciences (SHS) at University of Nottingham. Carli has also had roles as the Consultant Editor for RCNi Nursing Children and Young People and as the TOC21 Chief Examiner for Children’s Nursing.
Carli’s clinical interest and expertise predominantly focuses on Paediatric Critical Care but is extremely passionate about all professional nursing issues whilst advocating for children and young people and children’s nurses.
Carli is passionate about research, teaching and learning and has extensive knowledge and skills in delivering professional education. She works in collaboratively in partnership with the NHS, private and independent sector, and professional, statutory and regulatory bodies.
Carli's priorities for the coming months are:
- supporting and empowering the CYP workforce
- exploring the challenges of mental and physical health of CYP and their families to who care is provided
- ensuring all our work is considered from an equality, diversity, and inclusion perspective.
To enable progress in these priority areas she will:
- Listen to, learn from, encourage, and work with RCN members to provide support and guidance to enable the delivery of crucial and contemporary CYP work.
- Work collaboratively with all teams to ensure the challenges facing CYP, their families, and the workforce supporting them, are acknowledged and prioritised.
- Collaborate to ensure the CYP nursing voice is heard; whilst utilising expertise to influence and create change at strategic levels to shape service provision and priorities at a local, national, UK and international level.
Page last updated - 21/06/2024
