Stephanie Hechter

My passion is cancer and service improvement to benefit those facing a cancer journey or supporting them through that journey.

As a student nurse, a family member was diagnosed and seeing their cancer journey made me want to strive for something better for patients and families in my nursing career. In the Northwest, nurses wanting to work in cancer services are lucky to have The Christie and Clatterbridge to offer the opportunity to pursue a career as a ‘cancer nurse’.

Gaining experience in general and urology surgery, looking after post-operative cancer patients to then moving to an oncology inpatient unit at The Christie, both in the NHS and private setting allowed me to gain that experience. Caring for medical and clinical oncology patients with a wide range of clinical needs such as symptom management, acute oncological emergencies to supporting patients and their families their last days of life made me the cancer nurse I am today.

I gained experience as the radiation protection nurse for the Christie, managing the brachytherapy and molecular radiotherapy unit, which involved training and educating nursing staff to support patients but also caring for patients undergoing treatment.

I was fortunate to have the opportunity to move to New Zealand working as a community palliative care CNS and then managing the largest private elderly care facility.

I then returned to the Christie as the clinical service manager for SACT (systemic anti-cancer treatment) Outreach service. This involved the management of multiple SACT outreach clinics including a mobile SACT unit and units within other NHS trusts as well as the in-house Christie at Home service. During my time in the role; I developed and launched the Bloods Closer to Home service with the support and involvement from the Outreach team. The Bloods Closer to Home service supported Christie patients across Greater Manchester and Cheshire. The Christie at Macclesfield opened in 2021 and I was involved in the project management for SACT services prior to the opening and supporting the SACT team once the unit opened. During this time the SACT outreach service was nominated for a nursing times award for the collaboration with local hospices in which SACT clinics were delivered. The Bloods Closer to Home service also won an award from the Greater Manchester Cancer Alliance.

Both the SACT Outreach and Christie at Home services grew despite COVID delivering more activity closer to home or at home.

Since November 2022, taking on the role as assistant director of nursing in cancer services in the trust I trained at East Lancashire. Coming back to East Lancashire is where making a difference closer to home is even more of an incentive. Since coming back to the trust nearly 12 months ago, the dedication for pathway improvements at the front end right away through the cancer pathway is the reason I have the passion to come to work every day. Working alongside fantastic members of the MDT but more so the amazing nursing team at East Lancashire, who make me very proud daily to be a part of the team.

My nursing inspiration came from my mum but also her nurse friends, who are family. The group of my mum’s nurse friends ground me but also provide so much wisdom, advice, support and always remind me why I wanted to become a nurse. I became a nurse to make a difference, support nursing colleagues, empower those within my team but also drive service change to improve cancer patients journeys as an advocate.

In the wise words of Florence Nightingale; “Let us never consider ourselves finished nurses. We must be learning all our lives”.