Our Overseas Saviours
In 2019 the struggle in the UK to recruit clinical staff into care home settings was being felt at Heathlands Village.
The cost of filling the gaps with agency nurses was taking huge chunks out of our budget and on occasions we were badly bitten –forking out thousands of pounds of agency fees to take on new nurses, some of whom moved on at alarming speed, leaving us back at square one with the prospect of further expense.
It was time to think out of the box, and the solution came with our decision to widen our recruitment net and attract staff from overseas who joined us largely from India and Africa.This brought about an influx of expertise, increased the stability of our workforce, and put a stop to crippling agency fees.
Here we meet one of our overseas nurses – Doreen Headley. Having originally set her heart on teaching, Doreen quickly realised she could not deal with the noise of the classroom – though ironically these days she teaches in her church in the children’s department.
From 17 she went to work in the community helping to carry out health checks in the most vulnerable groups and this got her hooked on the idea of nursing. She eventually qualified as an RGN in 2005, adding midwifery to her skillset in 2013. Her love of learning continued taking her into a wide variety of nursing specialisms, working as a theatre nurse, in recovery, in gynaecology, oncology, outpatients’ clinics, maternity and in the community.
Her working life with The Fed began in our former Discharge to Assess (D2A) Centre in the Dr Simon Jenkins household. More recently she has become our “Heathlands butterfly” picking up shifts wherever required to cover sickness and annual leave.
Doreen’s story is not typical of the staff we have recruited from abroad – first of all, she is neither Indian nor African. She is, from the Caribbean, specifically Jamaica which she left in 2018. And, unlike our other foreign nurses who were recruited from their home countries to work for The Fed, Doreen left Jamaica to go to work in a small care home in the Central Lowlands of Scotland – a little place called Sauchie in Alloa, which she describes as “beautiful”. She did not come to Heathlands Village until April 2021.
While Doreen’s journey began differently from our other overseas staff, her experiences speak for many who join us from countries and cultures which are very different to the UK, bravely “upping sticks”, leaving loved ones and all that is familiar behind to seek employment in a foreign land – often with the sole aim of supporting people back home, and giving them a better chance in life.
Resettling in Manchester was not without frustrations but The Fed’s buddying scheme for new overseas staff was a help. Karen Johnson, our clinical director, arranged for Brandina Musonda to mentor Doreen.
Brandina had a lot of experience and helpful advice to share. Alongside this, Rebecca Ward in HR was assigned to support this cohort of workers and aid them in settling here. Doreen found Brandina’s help invaluable and feels so strongly about the need for help in navigating anew life in the UK that she has made it her business to offer support to others. She has managed to create
an informal network amongst foreign nursing staff – and receives calls from all over the country. She offers emotional and practical support and even at times is prepared to put her hand in her pocket to lend money when people are struggling.
For a country which seems to have a shortage of qualified nursing staff we do not seem to encourage people to stay. Doreen explains how last November she reached her fifth anniversary of entry into the UK, making her eligible to apply for “indefinite leave to remain”. This is the first stage for people wishing to acquire citizenship, and costs £2,885 per person with a decision usually within 6 months.
Twelve months after your leave is granted you can apply for citizenship but that will put you back another £1,580. For Doreen and her husband John – who also works at Heathlands Village as a bank social care worker – to achieve citizenship they will need to find a staggering £9,930. But she assures us that she is here to stay in the UK: “At 53 I don’t need to go on any adventures!” she laughs – though she would love to go back and see Scotland.
Doreen fondly remembers the beginning of her employment at Heathlands when she was accommodated in a one-bed studio flat in the Village. “I loved that place! I had everything I needed, and I was so comfy!” Her appreciation is evident but her compliments about The Fed are not limited to that: she praises her managers for the support they give:
“They’re never too busy to listen,” and clearly loves her place of work, speaking about it with pride, enthusing about the physical setting, the cleanliness, and above all that, “Dignity and respect are here!” She marvels at how these principles are displayed in the way each resident is treated as an individual. “There are so many things I am grateful for here. Sometimes it’s little things which mean so much, such as on a Thursday when we are often left snacks in the staff rooms.”
Doreen and John have three children (Abigail, Daniel and Johness) back in Jamaica and usually go home together to visit them each June, but that is currently unaffordable. At 29 Abigail is the eldest of the three, She qualified as a police officer but is currently working in private security for high profile individuals whilst studying for a doctorate in social work. Daniel, 28, also currently works in security. Doreen’s stepdaughter Johness, also 28, has sickle cell disease and despite her ill health, works in the restaurant industry.
The instability of Johness’s health makes John’s bank work a must as it allows him the flexibility of dropping everything to fly out to Jamaica in an emergency. Whilst the children mostly work, they still rely on their parents to pay the mortgage on the family home and other outgoings.
As a Seventh Day Adventist Doreen finds working for a Jewish organisation a good fit and notes
several similarities between Judaism and her own faith such as not observing Christmas and Easter, not eating pork or fish which do not have scales and fins, and keeping a sabbath on Saturday when secular activities are not permitted. She adds that her strongly traditional way of life also requires women to dress modestly and not wear make-up or jewellery other than a wedding ring.
Chatting to Doreen you realise she is not one to complain however hard it is to be living thousands of miles from her children and homeland. Strength seems to run down her maternal
line: “My grandmother would say if you had a problem you ‘mop it up, squeeze it out, and work with what you’ve got left’. Plus, I come from a large family; there was not a lot of money, so you learnt to appreciate what you had – but that was a common way of seeing things where I come from – that and looking out for each other.
This attitude, alongside her strong faith clearly motivates how she approaches life. You wonder how she fits in working full-time, teaching, sorting clothes as a volunteer with the British Red Cross and running her one-woman-band supporting other overseas nurses, regularly phoning
people on her list to check how they’re doing and “not stopping ‘til I’m sure they’re ok”.
That quality of ‘going the extra mile’ for others is what The Fed prides itself on. As an organisation we can only be as good as the sum of our parts which is why having people like Doreen on the team is priceless.