Drink Talking website is a winner | News

Anthony Gartland, Lead Nurse to the Alcohol Liaison Team, is a familiar face on the Health Service Awards (HSJ) stage, having been part of the team to win the HSJ Patient Safety Changing Culture Award in 2020. He also won the Chief Nurse of England Silver Award in 2019.

This year he was part of a winning team, which took home the HSJ Partnership Awards for Best Educational Programme for the NHS. 

Anthony worked with pharma group Kyowa Kirin, five experienced Alcohol Liaison Nurses (ALN) and a Consultant in Emergency Medicine to set up an educational website during Covid to support ALNs nationally. The Drink Talking Online Portal provides a valuable resource for patients, families and clinicians. 

Anthony said: “The website, which went live in 2020, aims to help other Alcohol Liaison Team services set up across the UK, with resources such as business case examples and guidance on who to contact for funding. We hope it will be a useful resource for other Alcohol Liaison Nurses and they can learn from our example about how to develop services. It’s also useful for GPs who can get information about supporting their patients, what types of services to refer to and where to signpost people.

Praising the Drink Talking Portal project, the HSJ judges said: “This is an excellent initiative harnessing shared collaboration of partnership working. The ability to adapt and respond quickly and effectively at such a challenging time has made a real difference to this vulnerable group of service users. The programme utilised digital platforms and was cost effective. The presenters of this were very passionate and humble about this achievement and thoroughly deserving winners.”