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NWAFT<\/p>\nNWAFT<\/p>\n
Angelo Cuenca was 23 years old when he first came to work at Peterborough Hospital which was known as Edith Cavell Hospital<\/p>\n
A local NHS trust is celebrating 25 years since the arrival of its very first cohort of Filipino nurses.<\/p>\n
Angelo Cuenca was among 34 pioneering nurses who left the Philippines to join what is now the North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust (NWAFT) in 2000.<\/p>\n
A quarter of a century later, he has become a Macmillan radiotherapy specialist nurse and says Peterborough “is home now.<\/p>\n
“I have been blessed to be surrounded and supported by so many good people,” Mr Cuenca said.<\/p>\n
“Care and compassion for us is not just a professional norm, but our way of life.”<\/p>\n
The trust says a private party for the Filipino nurses and their families is planned for early November.<\/p>\n
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NWAFT<\/p>\n
The North West Anglia NHS Foundation Trust said nine of the original nurses still worked across its sites<\/p>\n
Recalling his journey with the hospital, Mr Cuenca said: “My girlfriend came with me to the recruitment agency and to our surprise we were invited to sit a nursing exam on the spot. We passed \u2013 and the rest, as they say, is history.”<\/p>\n
He continued: “On arrival in Peterborough there were a few things which shocked me.<\/p>\n
“In the Philippines all nurses were trained to cannulate patients, and at the time, this was not the case here.<\/p>\n
“I was also assigned to care for the elderly, another shock to the system as back home we were not used to our elderly relatives being cared for in hospital.”<\/p>\n
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NWAFT<\/p>\n
Inocencia “Lynie” Gazo recently retired from her post<\/p>\n
Inocencia “Lynie” Gazo left her husband and young son behind when she first came to work at the trust. They were reunited a year later.<\/p>\n
She began her career at the former Peterborough District Hospital as a staff nurse, later rising to work in the chemotherapy day unit.<\/p>\n
“Our group of nurses received such a warm and kind welcome from the trust,” she recalled.<\/p>\n
“We were given a wonderful meal, an advance on our pay, fully prepared flats with groceries, and even a phone card to call home.<\/p>\n
“It meant so much to us.”<\/p>\n
Retchel Serofia, a deputy sister and professional nurse advocate at Huntingdon’s Hinchingbrooke Hospital, said joining the NHS trust was “one of the best decisions I have ever made”.<\/p>\n
“I came abroad not only for myself but also to help my family. I enjoy my role and the fantastic team I work with.”<\/p>\n
Jo Bennis, chief nurse at the trust, said: “It cannot have been easy to leave family and friends thousands of miles away to follow their professional dream.<\/p>\n
“It’s an honour to know they call Peterborough ‘home’ and have made their lives here.”<\/p>\n
Nine out of the original 34 are still working at the trust.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NWAFT Angelo Cuenca was 23 years old when he first came to work at Peterborough Hospital which was…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":218808,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[64,63,137,500],"class_list":{"0":"post-218807","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-healthcare"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218807","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=218807"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/218807\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/218808"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=218807"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=218807"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=218807"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}