University Limerick Hospitals Group
Barbara is an Assistant Director of Infection Control Nursing in University Limerick Hospitals Group, Ireland. She qualified as a RGN in 1995 and graduated from the Royal College of Surgeons, with a Master’s Degree in Nursing in 2007, where she conducted a seminal research study on hand hygiene in Ireland. She is a senior nurse leader with over 17 years working in the specialised field of Infection Prevention & Control. She is the Healthcare Associated Infection Lead for the University Limerick Hospitals Group and manages the infection control service for Carbapenemase Producing Enterobacteriaceae (CPE) for this group of acute hospitals in the Mid-west region. She has collaborated with a multidisciplinary team in the design of an interdisciplinary Infection Prevention and Control in Healthcare module, in University of Limerick and is a member of the organising committee for the Safe Patient Course in the Royal College of Surgeons (RCSI) in Ireland. She has undertaken post-graduate training in the Royal colleague of physicians (RCPI) on Leadership and quality improvement. She has co-authored several published studies in the academic literature and presented at several national and international infection control conferences. Her main interests within infection control are hand hygiene, Quality Improvement, CPE and patient’s experiences. Her personal goal is to lead and influence the agenda of patient centeredness in infection control at a national level.
She is a member of the Infection Prevention Society UK, and Infection Prevention Control Ireland (IPCI).
Disclosure of interest: none declared