Date with Duchess for Mexborough health worker

A MEXBOROUGH health visitor is preparing to rub shoulders with royalty to mark the anniversary of a scheme to support bereaved parents.

Louise Bertman, who is based at Mexborough Children's Centre, will be joined by Nick Bedford, a health visitor at Sandringham Road Health Centre in Intake, will meet the Duchess of Gloucester on December 3 at St James’ Palace.

The pair, who work for Rotherham Doncaster and South Humber NHS Foundation Trust (RDaSH), have been invited to represent their colleagues from Doncaster to mark the 25th anniversary of the Care of Next Infant (CONI) programme, which is run by the Lullaby Trust, and to recognise the hard work that they and their colleagues do.

CONI is for parents who have suffered a sudden and unexpected death of a baby and often feel anxious when they have another baby.

The Lullaby Trust runs the programme, which is a national health-visitor led service for bereaved parents which supports families before and after the birth of their new baby.

Nick said: “I'm really looking to meeting the Duchess on behalf of my colleagues who work hard to support parents to be.”