A NEW director of nursing has joined the NHS West Hampshire Clinical Commissioning Group (CCG).

Ellen McNicholas has joined the CCG from Solent NHS Trust where she was on secondment as Operational Director for community teams in Portsmouth. Her substantive post was Deputy Director of Nursing.

She trained in Glasgow and her main interests were general medicine and community nursing, but she also worked in intensive care.

Ellen moved to Jersey in the late 1990s to work in the private sector before returning to the mainland in 2002 when she joined Solent as a matron at the Western Community Hospital, Southampton.

At Solent, Ellen managed a range of services including prison healthcare, community teams, GP out of hours services, walk-in centres and minor injury units and mental health care.

She also spent nearly seven years away from nursing as a police officer.

She said “I am really looking forward to getting to know the teams at the CCG.

“I am hoping that as someone who already knows the local system I will be able to hit the ground running.”

Chief Officer at West Hampshire CCG, Heather Hauschild said: “We are really pleased to welcome Ellen to the CCG and are looking forward to working with her to improve quality, which is so important in improving patient care and driving up standards.”