Maria Zaheer, Bradford District Care Trust
After the success of organising HIW in 2025, this year HIW 2026 brought together colleagues from across Bradford District Care Trust, Bradford Teaching Hospitals and Airedale Hospital. We celebrated HIW by organising a week of high‑quality, informative, health‑focused sessions. With the presenters from nine different organisations (Bradford Council, Living Well, Patient Information Forum, Healthwatch, Mind Bradford District and Craven, Pennine Breast Imaging, Women Zone, Bradford Teaching Hospital & Bradford District Care Trust) the event covered a wide range of topics including Children & Young People, Translated Information & Interpretation, Women’s Health, Mental Health, and Winter Health.
Event Planning:
To organise this awareness week, a lot of planning was involved. As soon as the themes were announced our teams (BDCT, BTHFT, and AGH) held an initial meeting to discuss what we could offer for each topic. Everyone agreed to approach different organisations to explore potential speakers for the themed sessions. I led this meeting and proposed a timeline for the tasks so we could monitor progress effectively, and all members were happy with the plan.
| Event Planning Timeline and Key Actions | |
| Actions | Deadline |
| Speaker Coordination & Preparatory Tasks: • Identify potential speakers and confirm their availability and preferred time slots. • Collect speaker biographies and headshots for promotional use. • Create and maintain an HIW page on FutureNHS to ensure the team has access to up‑to‑date information. | 19th November |
| 25th November | |
| Create Webinar Sessions • Set up webinar sessions on Microsoft Teams, including session titles, descriptions, speaker details, and scheduled times. | 28th November |
| Share Webinar Invitations with Speakers • Send calendar invitations containing session links to all speakers. • Confirm receipt of invitations to ensure speakers have successfully received the webinar invites. | 1st – 4th December |
| Event Promotion • Liaise with Act as One Communications to request placement of event information on their website for external audience. • Develop a marketing pack, including: Event poster Intranet/comms blog Screensavers Email signature footer • Share promotional materials with the organising team for dissemination through internal and external communication channels & newsletters. | Mid December |
| 8th December | |
| Mid December | |
| Gather Presentation Slides • Ensure all presentation slides are requested from speakers and gathered ahead of the event. | 9th – 16th January |
| Final Checks & Event Hosting • Coordinate daily hosting responsibilities, with each session led by a different HIW organising team member. • Share the customised Teams background and intro/outro script with event organisers. | 13th January |
| Circulate presentation slides and the event feedback form to attendees. | After each session |
Setting this timeline proved really helpful, as it ensured each task was completed on schedule and prevented any potential challenges. I also drafted emails in advance, which saved me time later when managing my day‑to‑day responsibilities.
Event Promotion:
For the Teams webinar background, I used the nationally provided graphics that were created to promote the event on social media. For everything else, including the event poster, email signature footer, and the Teams background I used Canva. It’s very user‑friendly and gives a professional finish to the designs.
All promotional materials were shared with the organising team and speakers for wider distribution. We also secured a dedicated page on the Act as One website, providing a single, accessible platform where the audience could register and find all event‑related information.
Event Attendance & feedback:
A total of 90 individuals registered for the sessions, with 71 attending across the week. Feedback forms were shared daily along with presentation slides and information about the following day’s session. Ten completed feedback responses have been received.
Overall, participants found the sessions highly informative, eye‑opening, and relevant to their work. Key learning points included the importance of culturally sensitive and accurate translation, understanding differences between languages, and recognising when certain therapies, such as art therapy may be more effective than traditional talking approaches. Attendees also valued insights into interpreting services, school‑based wellbeing initiatives, and health awareness topics like breast cancer. Across all sessions, the high quality of presentations and practical, applicable information were consistently highlighted as the most useful aspects.
Personal Reflection:
As I am also a member of the national HIW group, I contributed to developing annual themed resource sheets, which strengthened my learning and research abilities. This responsibility required careful consideration of accuracy and quality, knowing the information would be shared at a national level.
Furthermore, coordinating a five‑day event and liaising with presenters enhanced my organisational, leadership, and negotiation skills. Consistent, clear, and effective communication among team members was key to delivering a successful awareness week.
Conclusion:
Our HIW 2026 was a successful series of events that delivered valuable learning, encouraged collaboration, and sparked meaningful discussion across our local health and care system. The feedback we received highlighted not only the strengths of the sessions but also opportunities to refine and expand future topics.
If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me at : maria.zaheer@bdct.nhs.uk
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