“It's rewarding to see positive outcomes for patients living with long term skin conditions following the right treatment at the right time alongside education.”
As a young girl Sharon Credland used to help her granny who volunteered in the tea shop at Burnley Teaching Hospital – and 44 years later she is there working as a Clinical Nurse Specialist in Dermatology.
She said:
After school I used to come to the hospital to help my granny restock and tidy up in the tearoom. My dad would pick me up after dropping off my mum who was an evening domestic on the Edith Watson Maternity Unit. My auntie also worked in the state-of-the-art ECG/Cardiology Department as a trainee technician, so it was no surprise that I started my nurse training at the same hospital in July 1988!
I look after patients with long term skin disease who are on medication. It's so rewarding to see positive outcomes for patients living with long term skin conditions following the right treatment at the right time alongside education. A few of the current patients I used to look after when they were children and now come with their children which is wonderful to see but makes me feel long in the tooth!
The advent of biologic treatments in recent years has been a life changer for patients who are eligible for them. For years all psoriasis patients had access to were creams and a small selection of systemic drugs but now we have the ability to prescribe biologic treatments which can transform their lives, in fact most patients do say they have been life changers. It's so rewarding to see them not having to think about their skin on a daily basis. And even more recently we have been able to prescribe biologics for our eczema patients to make their quality of life so much better.
I enjoy my work; every day I try and learn something new. I also like supporting other colleagues and sharing the knowledge and skills I have learnt over the years. My colleagues are like a work family and are a fabulous bunch of people who make me smile each day.