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The Top 10

8

Professor
Laura Serrant

Professor of Nursing,
Sheffield Hallam
University

NEW
2018

he says her motto is “lift as you climb” – and Professor conducting research into compassion in practice, called The
Serrant’s long and distinguished career in healthcare Silences Framework. She is chair of the Chief Nursing Office
Sis testament to that. for England’s BME Strategic Advisory Group, a member of
One of only six (out of 262) black professors of nursing the Government’s independent advisory group on black and
in the UK, she is a determined and impassioned voice for minority ethnic issues and an ambassador for the Equality
equality. Named one of the most inspirational women in Challenge Unit for Higher Education.
healthcare by the Health Services Journal, she began her A 2017 Florence Nightingale scholar – a prestigious
career as a nurse and outreach worker with prostitutes, research funding award – she is also an impassioned
BME communities, drug and alcohol dependents and the ambassador for the Mary Seacole Memorial Statue, a tribute
homeless, and during the early 1990s worked to tackle social to the Jamaican-born Crimean war nurse. It was unveiled in
attitudes to HIV and Aids. the garden of St Thomas’ Hospital, London, following a long
Her specialist areas of research include health disparities, campaign. As a former Mary Seacole Nursing Leadership
diversity leadership, sexual health and transcultural issues Award winner she describes the 19th century nurse as “one of
in health and wellbeing. the giants on whose shoulders I proudly stand”.
Her career in academia began by chance, when she was She has won numerous awards, including the Fellowship of
asked to cover for a friend at a Nottingham college healthcare the Queens Nursing Institute for her leadership in community
education evening. She ended up director of care, health nursing. In 2010, she was appointed to the Prime Minister’s
and childcare services there, before joining the University of commission for the review of Nursing and Midwifery. She is
Nottingham as head of adult health. visiting professor at The University of the West Indies, The
Now Professor of Nursing in the Centre for Health and Faculty of Health Sciences at Dominica State College and
Social Care Research at Sheffield Hallam, Professor Serrant Universidade Federal do Rio Grande Do Sul, Brazil, and the
has developed and published a theoretical framework for Warsaw Medical University, Poland.

20 Powerlist 2018