Coming to GOSH
Meet the team
There are 2400 people working at GOSH, all contributing to your child's
care, either directly or indirectly. It can be confusing to work out who
does what, but we hope that this section explains a little more about some
of the staff you could meet during your appointment or stay with us. For
a longer list of who's who, please see our glossary.
Doctors
Our doctors work in clinical teams, all dealing with children with similar
illnesses or conditions. Within each clinical team, there are doctors of
different grades. Usually a doctor's grade depends on his or her experience
but not always. The different grades of doctors are:
- Junior doctor - the collective name given to Senior House
Officers and Specialist Registrars.
- Senior House Officer - a qualified doctor who is learning
to specialise in children's medicine or surgery.
- Specialist Registrar - a doctor who is going through
their higher specialist training and is working towards becoming a consultant.
- Consultant - a senior doctor who is in charge of a
team of more junior doctors and coordinates your child's care. They usually
referred to by their specialised area of medicine, for example, Consultant
Endocrinologist. For a full list of the specialised areas of medicine,
please see our glossary.
Nurses
Each ward has a team of nurses providing care 24 hours a day, seven days
a week. Each shift has a mixture of junior and senior nurses, managed by
the Nurse in Charge, who could be a Ward Sister, Charge Nurse or Senior
Staff Nurse.
- Student Nurse - There are two types of student nurses:
those already qualified nurses now training to be children's nurses (post-registration),
and those starting from scratch to become children's nurses (pre-registration).
- Staff Nurse - a qualified nurse who is either a member
of the ward team or temporary staff working regularly on the ward (agency
or bank staff).
- Senior Staff Nurse - a qualified nurse who has had
extra training and experience, who stand in for the ward sister or charge
nurse if they are absent.
- Ward Sister or Charge Nurse - the nurse in charge of
the ward, called Ward Sister if female, or Charge Nurse if male.
- Clinical Nurse Specialist - a nurse specialised in
one or a small group of conditions.
- Practice Educator - the nurse responsible for teaching
and training other nurses on the ward.
- Modern Matron - Each Modern Matron is responsible for
the running of a number of wards.
Other members of the ward team
As well as the doctors and nurses, there will be other people looking
after your child on the ward.
- Health Care Assistant - someone who has had training
in care skills, but is not a nurse.
- Housekeeper - responsible for the smooth running of
the ward, for instance, dealing with food requests and cleanliness.
- Clinician's Assistant - supports the medical and nursing
staff in administrative duties.
- Medical Secretary - works closely with doctors, organising
patient appointments, letters and other administration.
- Play Specialist - a nursery nurse or child care worker
who has taken extra qualifications and can prepare your child for any test
or operation through play.
- School teacher - can help your child keep up with school
work and advise about education in general.
- Ward administrator - maintains the administrative area
of the ward, registering patients and filing reports in medical notes.
All of our staff wear an identification badge, so if you do not know who
someone is, please ask him or her to show it to you, or ask another member
of staff.
UCL Institute of Child Health
Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children NHS Trust
