Casualty hires front line NHS staff as new writers for the show
Casualty has announced the winners of its NHS frontline writing competition.
Last year, as part of the 35th anniversary celebrations, Casualty launched a contest to find new writers for the show with direct medical experience.
Joining the team will be Samantha Bacchus, a frontline medical worker for over 15 years. She has worked within maternity, A+E, and on the respiratory wards as both an Auxiliary Nurse and a Staff Nurse, before moving to the prison service as an Offending Behaviour Programme Facilitator. Samantha is now a full-time novelist.
As well as Samantha, writing duo Laura Griffiths and Chris Griffiths have also joined the team. Laura has worked for the NHS for over 33 years and is currently a District Nurse.
Chris began his career as a paramedic before retraining as an Anaesthetic Practitioner. Most recently, he has worked within the Resuscitation Team, attending traumas and training doctors and nurses in CPR.
Sarah Beeson, Script Producer at Casualty said: ‘We were hugely impressed by the standard of all the applications, but Samantha, Chris and Laura really stood out to us with their authentic creative ambition and clear passion for Casualty. We are extremely excited to now be working with them on their shadow scripts and look forward to developing them as future Casualty writers while learning from their fascinating true-life experiences.’
Discussing their new career path, Laura and Chris commented: ‘We’re delighted to have this opportunity to work with the Casualty team; their enthusiasm for highlighting the challenges the NHS and its staff face daily is fantastic, and we really look forward to contributing our own voices and perspectives.’
Samantha added: ‘I am utterly thrilled to have this opportunity to work with the Casualty team to develop an episode – I have been a huge fan since the series began and it inspired my decision to enter nursing.’
The new writers will work with the Casualty team on shadow scripts and help develop future storylines.
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