Every year, the Northern Health Science Alliance (NHSA) runs the ‘North Innovation Women’ campaign, which recognises women who are pushing the boundaries of innovation.
In the 400-strong list, four Newcastle Hospitals’ colleagues have been acknowledged for the work they do in the innovation field.
Congratulations to Corinne, Melanie, Jo, and Kim who feature on the 2025 innovation list:
Corrine Johnson
Corinne has led the rollout of a maternity electronic patient record called BadgerNet – a single, fully integrated record of end-to-end maternity care.
Corrine has brought insight and experience from her previous trust to support a smooth transition across the Newcastle’s maternity services.
She is an advocate of the Great North Care Record, the region’s shared care record, which enables health and care professionals to securely access patient data from multiple providers in one platform.
Melanie Shield
Melanie has been working as a senior commercial business manager in the commercial enterprise team for the last two years. She joined the trust in 2021 as commercial manager for the North East Innovation Lab, supporting the development of new diagnostic tests for covid and expanding into diagnostics for other disease areas.
The commercial enterprise team works with industry, academia, NHS colleagues and partners to support innovation and develop commercial opportunities which can be re-invested back into NHS services.
Jo Noble, associate director of operations
Jo is associate director of operations for the clinical research directorate, overseeing over 400 colleagues involved in the delivery of around 500 vital clinical trials and studies each year.
Jo previously spent eight years in the urology and renal directorate before taking on her current role. Along with research, she has a passion for staff health and wellbeing.
Kim Keltie, lead healthcare scientist
Kim has worked in the trust since 2010 within the Northern Medical Physics and Clinical Engineering directorate.
Kim is service lead for the Newcastle External Assessment Group, a collaboration between the trust and Newcastle University. It provides independent support to the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence Health Technology Evaluation Programme, informing national guidance development to ensure all NHS patients get the best, evidence-based care.
Dr Vicky McFarlane-Reid, director for commercial development and innovation at Newcastle Hospitals said:
“Congratulations to Corinne, Mel, Jo and Kim for being nominated in this year’s North Innovation Women campaign.
“I’m proud to work with colleagues who are dedicated to finding new and better ways to deliver the best care possible to our patients.”
This year, inspiration has been taken from the NHSA’s Health Equity North Woman of the North report, with the report’s themes being used to inspire suggestions of women working to address regional inequalities that women face.
This year’s list features hundreds of women who are achieving great things and inspiring those around them across the North of England.
Hannah Davies, NHSA chief executive, said: “This is a record-breaking number of recommendations for North Innovation Women, and I want to thank everyone who supported the campaign.
“This year, we used our Woman of the North work to inspire recommendations and it’s clear just how hard people are working to fight the wide-ranging inequalities that women face throughout their lives.
“Congratulations to everyone who made the list, the breadth and range of women is not only inspirational but is indicative of the talent we have here in the North of England.”
- View the full list on the NHSA website
