Lauren Scott, Care Coordinator in the Transition Care Program (TCP), received the ‘Rising Star’ award at our recent Quarterly Staff Recognition Awards.

She was nominated by Vanessa Goss from Bundoora Transition Care, who said Lauren was successfully able to reinvent herself as a Care Coordinator and utilise her previous experience as a social worker to adapt to the new role.

“She took on this challenge with resilience and fortitude, and conducted herself with professionalism, while developing excellent outcomes for her clients. She brought her social work skill set and provided TCP colleagues with a new insight and skills into managing conflict and family dynamics,” she said.

Lauren has been at Northern Health since September 2014, and initially started as a social worker at Bundoora. After working there for four years, she moved to transition care.

“In social work, I really love working with patients in crisis situations and finding ways to support them and their families. I am also doing my Masters in Counselling and it all ties together for me,” she said.

“I enjoy providing emotional support to patients and families, and supporting carers.”

In transition care, Lauren is able to do more long-term work and relationship building, whilst supporting patients when they’ve just returned home.

“I can help with supporting them to stay well in their own homes. I enjoy the continuity – seeing patients from when they come to hospital to providing support in their own homes,” she explains.

Lauren feels honoured to have been nominated for the award and was surprised to hear she won.

“The award was a lovely surprise and shows how supportive my colleagues are. I am really lucky to work in a great team, we learn from each other all the time and we always support each other,” she said.

Before joining Northern Health, Lauren was a social worker at Royal Melbourne for five years and at Western Health for a year.

In the future, she would love to continue working in transition care, supporting our patients in the community.

“Every team that I’ve worked with at Northern Hospital has been incredible and supportive, and in the next few years I would still like to be working at Northern, and be able to utilise my counselling skills once I complete my Masters,” she said.

She would also like to potentially set up support groups for carers, to help carers maintain that role and keep our patients at home safely as long as possible.

“I see Northern Heath continually expanding and increasing in services. Both young and old people come to hospital all the time, so I would love to see the hospital expand, as our catchment area is growing and people’s care needs are getting more and more complex,” she added.

Lauren sees an opportunity to increase all of our knowledge in cultural sensitivity and cultural awareness in the future.

“Being culturally sensitive means we will continue to tailor our services to meet the needs of our patients and families, so we can support them better,” she added.

Lauren describes Northern Health as a place where her family and friends are.

“I’ve been lucky that my colleagues here have become my friends and family – I live in the area, my dad used to work here and I’ve seen my friend’s babies born here.”

Featured Image left to right: Briana Baass, Executive Director – Chief Allied Health Officer and Partnerships, with award winner Lauren Scott