Warning – This blog contains gifts!

Last week I presented at the Chief Nursing Officer’s conference on ‘Digital Professionalism’.  In my presentation I urged all the senior nurses to role model how we can be professional in the new emerging digital spaces; how we needed to show young professionals how to blend professional and digital behaviours.  I see good blogging as part of this role modelling, so, my gift to you these days before Christmas are some recommended blogs and why I read them.  They all exemplify digital professionalism in one form or another.

Crossing Boundaries

In my early forays into social media I was wary of blogging and didn’t, dare I say, ‘get it’.  This blog is why I started blogging.  It’s not a health related blog but I still read it and it makes me think.  It’s brain food.

Steve’s blog gives a great insight into education and learning using technology.  It was this blog that made me start to wonder how we could apply blogging for nursing reflective practice – I still think we can and I think the quad blogging model could perhaps be adapted for reflective work.

Steve Wheeler’s learning with ‘e’s http://steve-wheeler.blogspot.co.uk/

Another boundary spanner is the wonderful blog by @ClaireOT.  This time it’s a profession boundary spanner – Claire is an OT specialising in mental health – again without Claire I wouldn’t be blogging.  Claire’s blogs are well informed and insightful – she always does her homework and I learn something new every time I read them.

ClaireOT’s blog http://claireot.wordpress.com/

The Patient’s Perspective

I have always believed that we should listen carefully to people who use NHS services.  I spent 9 years as a complaints manager in a large acute trust and I learnt more in that role about how services work (and don’t work) and how people perceive what we do, than any other role in my almost 30 years of NHS working.  There are many brilliant patient blogs around but I have a couple of favourites.

The Real Bag Lady is a special favourite mainly because of how it made me focus on another long term condition that is very different to my diabetes.  This again broadened my thinking but I was also struck by some similarities.  Wendy is also a feisty lady (which I love) and writes in an engaging way.  This is one of the blogs I actively look for.

The Real Bag Lady http://mybagladylife.blogspot.co.uk/

Dr Kate Granger’s blog is a must read for all of us who work in health.  Kate is a local girl to me but I’ve never met her but I feel privileged to read her story.  Again – if you want to know what it’s like to be a patient Kate tells you, warts and all.

DrKateGranger http://drkategranger.wordpress.com/2012/12/13/emotional-rollercoasters-the-ups-and-downs-of-riding-them/

Communication with staff and teams

I think there are plenty of reasons why senior organisational leaders should consider blogging as a way to connect with their staff and teams.  Here are two CEOs whose blogs I read.  They, for me, show how you can have different conversations within organisations.

Dr Mark Newbold http://www.marknewbold.com/

Lisa Rodrigues http://www.sussexpartnership.nhs.uk/about/news/articles/520-ce13122012

Here is another sample but I think the blog is set within the Trust’s site and Paul publishes via Twitter:

Paul Roberts http://www.wales.nhs.uk/sitesplus/documents/863/Weekly%20Message%2014th%20December%202012.pdf

A blog that really makes me think

This blog is a real gem, if you want something that makes you think and think hard.  Jonathan Tomlinson is a GP in Hackney, London.  I don’t always agree with Jonathan but his blogs are so well researched and written that I go back time after time.

Abetternhs’s blog  http://abetternhs.wordpress.com/about/

Finally – the future

I suggested in my presentation to the director’s of nursing that we needed to learn from the younger people in our workforce about digital behaviours.  Here is a wonderful blog by Mike Minihan, who went to Uganda – he has since returned to the UK and qualified as a nurse.  I have encouraged him to carry on blogging!  Read the last blog about his return to the UK – thought provoking stuff.

Mike Minihan http://mikedminihan.tumblr.com/

There are of course many more blogs that I could point you at but these are definitely on my top of the shop list.  There are also many diabetes bloggers but I might do that in the new year!  I hope you enjoy these – Happy Christmas!