By Andrew Jenkins, Williams Medical Supplies

It gives us enormous pleasure to congratulate Claire Shea from Longford Surgery on winning the National Association of Primary Care (NAPC) Practice Manager of the Year Award, proudly sponsored by Williams Medical.

With GP surgeries facing ever-increasing demands, the exceptional work undertaken by Practice Managers is more important than ever before. Here at Williams, we’re privileged to have so much contact with healthcare professionals, managers and practice teams who perform tremendous work every single day. Our experiences were mirrored by the NAPC receiving over 100 individuals being nominated for the UK’s most prestigious Practice Manager of the Year award.

The quality of entries were especially high again this year and after much deliberation, the judging panel of Dr James Kingsland OBE (NAPC President & Senior GP Partner), Dr Nikkita Kanani (GP and CCG Clinical Executive) and Sally Kitt (NAPC Chief Operating Officer) chose Claire with notable reference to her contribution in establishing a successful GP Federation at the same time as running a busy practice.

Claire has been recognised for being instrumental in setting up the North Barnet Federation of 31 GP practices; allowing a network of practices to be able to access patient records and enabling patients to choose where they want to be seen. Helping to deliver care closer to the community, GPs can now refer their patients to other local practices for diagnostic services as an alternative to traditional hospital settings.

Demonstrating great drive and energy, coupled with strong IT competencies and management skills, Claire helped formulate the federation development plans, as well as running the federation call and referral centre and being a source of knowledge and support throughout the whole process. Nominated by a fellow Practice Manager in the area, Claire’s hard work is clearly greatly appreciated.

Claire was announced as the UK Practice Manager of the Year at the annual NAPC gala dinner, where she received her award from Hugh Hamer, Managing Director of Williams Medical. Commenting on the award, Hugh said “especially in times when morale is reported to be low in Primary Care, it’s vitally important that we recognise and celebrate the tremendous work that is taking place in practices across the country. We’re delighted to partner the National Association of Primary Care in helping to put the great work of Practice Managers firmly in the spotlight. On behalf of everyone at Williams Medical, I’d like to congratulate Claire and her team on everything that they have achieved.”

In addition to receiving the accolade of being named NAPC Practice Manager of the Year, Claire was presented with £1000 in holiday vouchers from Williams Medical.

Who will be recognised as Practice Manager of the Year 2016? Look out for details of next year’s awards over the coming months.