Lauren Diabetes Dietitian

Lauren joined UHS a year after qualifying as a dietitian back in 2011 and has had quite the journey since. Hear all about Lauren’s career journey at UHS below.

Can you tell us a bit about your time before UHS and why you chose Dietetics?

“I first discovered my interest in dietetics back in college. During my A levels, I figure out that I liked human biology, sciences and cooking so Dietetics felt like it was the perfect route for me to go down. In the year between qualifying and joining UHS, I was a dietitian down in Exeter on the bank. As soon as I saw the job for Southampton, I was really keen to join because of it being a teaching hospital”

Why did you choose to come to UHS?

“When I qualified, I wasn’t 100% sure what area of Dietetics I wanted to go into so I wanted to go to a large teaching hospital so I would get the opportunity to work across different areas. The Dietetics department at UHS is huge and we have different specialities within the wider team, for example, gastro and oncology. We also have community and acute dietitians in the same team so there is plenty of opportunities to find your speciality and develop your career into what you want it to be”

Why have you stayed at UHS?

“During my time at UHS, I have had lots of internal job opportunities, so I originally started in acute but moved to community. I have moved to different roles such as Home Enteral Feeding, Diabetes, Neuro Rehab and supporting healthy workforce projects. I have been able to discover my true passion which is Diabetes, health promotion and healthy workforce which is what I do now”

What opportunities have you had here?

“I have had plenty of opportunities such as CPD, study courses and conferences. For example, we get to go to the Diabetes UK conference and had done some specialist courses by the British Dietetic Association. I have also had the opportunity to do management courses within UHS, which has helped me to progress to higher bands within my career which has been really valuable”

What is the team environment like?

“I have always really enjoyed working within the department. We are a really friendly team and I think it's great we have a collective department of community and acute dietitians. We are also merged with Speech and Language Therapy which helps us because there is a lot of joint working between us and them. The team has always been really encouraging and supports your career progression”

Whether you are an experienced dietitian or a newly quailed dietitian, search our current opportunities to find the perfect role for you.