Karen Alred

Karen originally trained as an Enrolled Nurse back in the 1980’s at Great Ormond Street Children’s Hospital, had a number of years away from health so completed a return to nursing programme in 2004, following on with the conversion to RN(A) before moving into a community role. Completing the SCPHN (SN) PGDip, then MSc Public Health Nursing, she worked for 6 years within a specialist role for children with disabilities before heading into higher education, initially leading the school nurse pathway for the SCHPN programme. The PgC Health Education qualification for NMC Teacher level 4 was completed before moving across to her current role.

Teaching and other responsibilities

Karen is a lecturer in the School of Health and Sports Sciences and works primarily with FdA Health and Wellbeing Apprenticeships and BSc Nursing Apprenticeships, delivering modules and as an Enhanced Personal Tutor.  Additionally, she is the Clinical Learning Environment Support Lead for the James Paget Hospital Trust. Karen is passionate about working with children, young people and their families to enable facilitation of self-care as well as enabling opportunities for non-traditional students to achieve in the higher education environment.

Research Interests and other publications

Karen has published 2 articles related to her public health practice in school nursing and completed her MSc in assessment of children’s continence needs. She has a keen interest in how we work to support individuals to consider the role of power relationships and communication, whether these be for students in education or service users.