CCC staff have been shortlisted for the prestigious Nursing Times (NT) awards, which highlight excellence in nursing, leadership and nurse-led projects.
Joan Spencer, CCC CEO and Senior Responsible Officer of Cheshire and Merseyside Cancer Alliance (CMCA), has been shortlisted in the Nurse Leader of the Year category.
Joan was a cancer nurse before moving into management and joined CCC in 2014 as General Manager of Chemotherapy where she was instrumental in developing the Trust’s networked model of care with treatment sites across the region, and in ensuring the successful opening of its specialist hospital in Liverpool in 2020. She was also the driving force in establishing the multi-award-winning Clatterbridge in the Community service.
Joan joined CCC’s executive team in 2019 as Interim Director of Operations before becoming Chief Operating Officer in 2020, Deputy Chief Executive in 2024 and being appointed as CCC Interim Chief Executive in March 2025.
Alison Taylor, Nurse Consultant in Acute Oncology, has been shortlisted for Nurse of the Year. Last year, Alison won a coveted Churchill Fellowship to further research into cancer of unknown primary (CUP) and travelled around Australia to understand how its healthcare system manages CUP patients. Alison regularly cares for patients with CUP at CCC and is now passing on the knowledge from her trip to NHS colleagues at the Trust and beyond.
Last autumn, Alison was also instrumental in introducing a new tracking system helping genomic samples from CUP patients to reach specialist labs, which helped CCC reduce turnaround times in this area by almost half.
A service initiated by Sinead Benson, Clinical Nurse Specialist in Palliative Care, has been shortlisted for the Ingrid Fuchs Cancer Nursing Award. Enhanced supportive care for hepato-pancreato-biliary (HPB) cancer patients, which Sinead established, has been highlighted in this award. Through this integrated clinic, patients can access symptom control, psycho-social support and information as well as timely referrals for physiotherapy, OT, dietetics and benefits assessment – all on the same day that they see the oncologist without needing an additional appointment.
Over the four years the service has been running, patients have seen reduced symptom prevalence over time, including a reduction in pain, nausea and depression. As a result of improved symptoms there has been a reduced need for hospital admissions for this patient group as well as reduced need for some community and hospice services.
The Urgent Cancer Care programme (UCC) – an initiative from CCC and Cheshire and Merseyside Cancer Alliance – has been shortlisted for three NT awards: Team of the Year, Critical and Emergency Care Nursing Award and an Ingrid Fuchs Cancer Nursing Award.
The programme, the only one of its kind in the country, is an important element of many cancer patients’ journeys, addressing the unplanned care needs of patients who become unwell due to a new emergency diagnosis of cancer, side effects of cancer treatment, or worsening symptoms related to cancer progression and other comorbidities.
CMCA recently published a UCC strategy, with the vision and mission for transforming UCC is to ensure that all cancer patients in Cheshire and Merseyside with urgent care needs receive timely, effective, and equitable treatment. The goal is to seamlessly integrate oncology and urgent care teams, enhancing outcomes through education, advanced protocols, and continuous data-driven innovation.
The shortlisted entries will now go forward to the winners’ ceremony, which will be held in London on October 22nd.
