I met Elizabeth a long time ago, it was 2004 when I worked in Hammersmith & Fulham NHS Primary Care Trust. I have watched her over the years continue to be a pioneer and achieve success.
Elizabeth Anionwu is a retired nurse, campaigner and Emeritus Professor of Nursing at the University of West London. A fellow of the Royal College of Nursing, she spent 40 years in the profession and has been named one of the most influential nurses in the history of the NHS. Her career was distinguished by her pioneering work in the understanding of sickle cell disease - bringing better treatment and support to the thousands living with it. She was the first sickle cell and thalassaemia nurse counsellor in the UK. Her decades of dedication, care and service are a contrast to her own disrupted childhood as a mixed race child born out of wedlock in the 1940s, though it was the kindness of a nurse when she was just five that sparked a nascent interest in what would become her life’s work. After leaving school at 16, with seven O-levels, Elizabeth was made a Professor of Nursing in 1998.
She spent nine years fundraising and campaigning for a statue to British-Jamaican nurse Mary Seacole. Unveiled in 2016 in the grounds of St Thomas’ Hospital, London, the statue is the first in the UK to represent a named black woman. Elizabeth received the DBE in 2017 for services to nursing and the Mary Seacole Statue Appeal.
We sit down to talk about O from the Kindness A-Z. Optimism, a mental attitude characterised by hope and confidence in success and a positive future. Optimistic attitudes are linked to a number of benefits, better coping skills, lower stress levels, better physical health & higher persistence when pursuing goals. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2894461/
We create a recipe together for Optimism with the following ingredients; sense of humour, music, flexibility, being part of a team and gratitude.
I recommend her book which I read in 2017 and it is definitely 'A page turner of a book!' Dua Lipa. Her memoir Dreams from my mother is available in paperback, kindle and audio.
Twitter @EAnionwu
Talking about her book in more detail in 2017 to participants of the NHS LEAP programme I was running as a guest speaker https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8HyGuPq2_c
Desert Island Discs with Elizabeth Anionwu and the 8 tracks of music she selects https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m000jn8w