Michelle Hopkins Deputy Clinical Quality Director (South West)

About me

Michelle is a GenerationQ Fellow and Deputy Clinical Quality Director (South West) at NHS England and NHS Improvement.

A registered mental health nurse, Michelle Hopkins worked at Dorset HealthCare University NHS Foundation Trust since 1998. She started as a Community Psychiatric Nurse, progressed to Community Mental Health Team Leader and eventually to Clinical Risk Advisor.

At the time of her fellowship, Michelle was Head of Patient Safety and Risk at the trust, which serves a population of almost 700,000 people and employs 5,000 staff. Michelle managed a team of 12 and is responsible for the trust’s patient safety and clinical risk agenda. She worked collaboratively with the directors and board members, clinical leads, learning and development services and frontline staff: ‘Individually and with the team I am passionate about embedding the principle of delivering high-quality care first time, every time, and influencing a culture where this becomes “how we do things here”.’

Michelle is involved in a number of improvement projects under the trust’s Sign Up to Safety Campaign. These projects span a range of mental health and community health services for both inpatients and community patients. The projects involve carrying out an audit, identifying the key issues, learning from other trusts/organisations and engaging stakeholders.

Through GenerationQ Michelle is looking forward to enhancing her skills, and having a wider impact on influencing and sustaining improvement. She is also interested in furthering her abilities in coaching for improvement: ‘When staff are supporting to develop new ideas, their desire and commitment to improve care for patients flourishes.’