Reflections on championing personalised care in Lincolnshire
In a health and care system under constant pressure, it’s easy for work to become reduced to checklists, targets, and throughput. When time is short and demand is high, tasks naturally take centre stage. But when care becomes task-driven, we risk losing sight of the very reason the system exists.
The most meaningful and transformative shift we can make is also the simplest: deliberately and consistently shift the focus away from 'what's the matter' with the person, to what matters to them. Focusing care around the person doesn’t slow the system down; it strengthens it. It improves trust, outcomes, and staff satisfaction, and it reminds us that efficiency should serve compassion, not replace it.
In our conversation with Lead Midwife, Amy Garratt, and Specialist Nurse, Cat Howle, we explored what it really means to champion personalised care - and why strengths-based approaches are not “nice to have”, but essential to safe, effective and meaningful care.
About Amy and Cat
Amy Garratt is a Patient Safety Lead Midwife at United Lincolnshire Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust (ULTH). Cat Howle is a Cardiac Rehabilitation Specialist Nurse at Lincolnshire Community Health Services NHS Trust (LCHS).
Both Amy and Cat have taken part in the personalistion training the It's All About People team offer (see our Learning and Development Hub for more details), and have subsequently gone through our 'Train the Trainer' programme to become personalisation trainers themselves.
Amy and Cat are also It's All About People Personalisation Champions.
Starting with “What matters to you?”
At the heart of personalised care is the deceptively simple question "What matters to you?"
Cat explained how this shapes her work in Cardiac Rehabilitation. Her role is not just to support clinical recovery after a heart event, but to help people return to the life they value:
“Our job is to get people back to where they want to be, essentially.”
For one person, that might mean getting back on the golf course. For another, it might mean being able to push grandchildren on a swing. The clinical pathway may be similar, but the goals, and therefore the conversations, are entirely different.
Amy sees the same principle in maternity care:
“I love talking to families and getting them to kind of make them get the most out of their care.”
Personalised care means recognising that risk, choice, and preference sit differently for every family. A home birth, for example, might involve risk discussions, but it also reflects deeply held values. Shared decision-making ensures those values are not sidelined.
The message is clear: personalised care is not about offering more options. It’s about aligning care with what truly matters to the individual.
Strengths-based practice: Building on what people can do
A strengths-based approach shifts the focus from deficits to capabilities. Instead of asking, “What’s wrong?” it asks, “What’s strong?”
Cat described how, in Cardiac Rehabilitiation, they tailor exercise and recovery around what people enjoy and want to achieve:
“We can change how they want to do their exercises or focus their recovery based around those exercises in order to get them to do what they want to do.”
This is more than goal-setting. It’s about recognising people as active agents in their recovery. When someone is motivated by returning to a valued activity, they engage differently. The work becomes purposeful, not just prescribed.
Amy reflects on how the Personalisation training she had undertaken validated what she already felt as a midwife:
“This is the right thing to do. This is the best way to get the people that we care for… to get the best out of whatever journey they’re on.”
Strengths-based care affirms professional instincts too. Many practitioners enter health and care because they want to make a difference. Personalisation reconnects them with that purpose.
It’s simple, but not always easy
One striking reflection from the conversation is how “simple” personalised care can seem once it’s broken down.
Amy recalls a colleague saying:
“It just blew my mind with how simple it was.”
When you frame decisions as: What would you want for your mum? Your nephew? the principle becomes obvious. Of course people deserve to be involved. Of course their preferences matter.
And yet, implementing this consistently in pressured environments is not always straightforward. Cat acknowledged that resistance can arise:
“There are people who you’ll bang the drum against and they will just not get it… or have some resistance against it.”
Time pressures are a common concern. Taking three hours to attend training can feel like a luxury. Having deeper conversations can seem like an added burden.
But both Amy and Cat argued that personalised care often saves time in the long run. When you ask the right question at the beginning - “What do you want out of this conversation?” - the direction becomes clearer.
Cat: “You don’t then have to lead that because the patient does the work for you.”
That’s not about offloading responsibility. It’s about partnership. When people articulate their own goals, care becomes more focused, meaningful, and effective.
Learning across boundaries: The power of shared training
A powerful aspect of the It's All About People Learning and Development offer is its cross-system reach. A huge range of people working in health and care from across Lincolnshire have come together to learn about shared decision making and personalised care planning.
Amy reflected on how refreshing that is:
“It’s really easy to just fall into… maternity, maternity, maternity. And it’s great to hear from Social Prescribers, people working within GPs. We’ve met all sorts of people.”
Personalisation may look slightly different in each setting, but the underlying principles are shared.
And participants don’t just learn from the trainers; they learn from each other.
Cat highlighted this collaborative energy:
“It’s not just me and Amy doing the training. It’s also learning amongst the group.”
Breakout discussions, role-play, and shared examples create a space where professionals reflect on their own practice. Even those who begin the session feeling confident often leave “extremely confident,” equipped with new tools and language.
That boost in confidence matters. Personalised care is not a new task to bolt on; it’s a way of working that can reshape existing interactions.
Validation, motivation, and professional identity
One of the most compelling themes in our conversation with Amy and Cat was validation.
Amy described how training to be a trainer reinforced her belief that personalised care is fundamental:
“It kind of validated that actually this is the right thing to do.”
In high-pressure environments, it’s easy to question whether you’re doing enough, or doing it right. Personalisation training reminds professionals why they came into health and care in the first place.
Amy: “I think personalised care is one of the reasons we come into these jobs. It’s to look after people, and it’s to give people what they need.”
That reconnection to purpose can be transformative. It shifts the focus from compliance and targets to relationships and impact.
Becoming a Personalisation Champion: and leading cultural change
It’s All About People” champions are individuals - both health and care professionals and people with lived experience - who have been recognised for modelling personalised, strengths-based approaches in their day-to-day work and life.
For Cat, being nominated was affirming:
“It just gives you a little bit more oomph to kind of carry on, to hold the torch a little bit more.”
Champions are not superheroes with capes (though they do wear a badge!). They are people who embody the ethos of personalisation in everyday work and life.
Crucially, this creates a network. As Cat noted, there are “pockets of Champions in almost every service”
That means support is always close at hand. If someone is unsure how to apply personalised care in their setting, they can reach out to a peer who understands the context.
Cultural change rarely happens through policy alone. It spreads through people - through conversations, modelling and shared belief.
Conclusion: Personalisation is not an add-on - it’s the point!
What shone through in our conversation with Amy and Cat is not theory, but conviction.
Personalised, strengths-based care is not another initiative fighting for space on an already crowded agenda. It is the foundation of everything people working in health and care do - the core principle that should shape every interaction, decision, and plan with the people we support.
It begins with listening, grows through partnership, and flourishes when professionals feel confident, supported, and connected to a wider movement.
As Amy reflected, even attending a training session can be a powerful reminder:
“It just takes you back to why you probably applied for jobs in the first place.”
In a system under strain, that reminder matters. Because when care is truly “all about people,” outcomes improve, not just clinically, but emotionally and relationally too.
And perhaps the real strength of personalised care is this: it doesn’t require grand gestures. Sometimes, it just starts with one small, powerful question.
