Award for Dr Chris Nightingale

An associate Professor of Nursing who has dedicated her career to those with learning disabilities has said she is “still on a mission to make a difference” after winning an annual award.

Dr Chris Nightingale was nominated and won this year’s award in recognition of her outstanding contribution to Learning Disability Nursing earlier this month, at the NHS England East of England Learning Disability Celebration Event.

Her career, which has spanned more than 40 years, started with her originally training as a registered nurse for people with learning disabilities and this experience has influenced her whole career, her advocacy for fairness, equality, equity and social justice, and especially in health and education.

Reflecting on the award win, Dr Nightingale said: “I am very proud and honoured to have my work of many years recognised in this way, but there is still so much to do.

“I have been very lucky in my career to have had jobs where I could make individual small changes to a person’s life, right up to influencing Government policy on inclusive practices in education.

“There are amazing people working out in services and in policy areas to improve lives.

“Sadly, children and adults with a learning disability and autistic people still face stigma, discrimination and inequalities in the health, social care and education systems every day. 

“I am, absolutely, still on a mission to make a difference in what I do, what I teach and what I research.”

Other highlights from her long career have including working as a Community Learning Disability Nurse across Norfolk supporting children, adults, families and carers, and working in economically deprived communities.

She reported to the International Red Cross on the state of a learning disability hospital in the former Yugoslavia, entering a war zone in 1992, and held an international webinar on the plight of people with a learning disability in Ukraine in 2022, following it up with a seminar on the impacts of trauma on people with a learning disability in the same year.

With NIACE (National Institute of Adult and Continuing Education) now the Learning and Work Institute, she led on research and development work in further and higher education to improve learning experiences and promote inclusion for disabled people.

She continues to practice clinically when she can.

Nominating Dr Nightingale for the award, Sir Alan Tuckett, retired CEO of NIACE said she was “an outstanding candidate for recognition”.

“She has excelled as a frontline nurse for more than 40 years, working with adults and young people with learning disabilities, as a nurse trainer, and a researcher whose work has had national impact.”

To find out more about the University of Suffolk’s School of Nursing, Midwifery and Public Health go to School of Nursing, Midwifery and Public Health | University of Suffolk