From the Philippines to India and India to Italy, the NHS employs staff from over 200 different nationalities. Which means that the UK is home to hundreds of thousands of healthcare professionals with a very diverse set of cultural backgrounds.

This time, we’re talking about how our culture can inform our sense of identity. Can being away from our culture make us question our personal, or professional, identities? How can cultural context affect our sense of self and belonging? And what can we all do to help each other be our authentic selves at work?

Our host, Katy McDonald, is a Fellow for International Retention in NHS England North East and Yorkshire Region, and she’s joined by 2 expert guests to chat culture and identity

• Queen Okesola, a mental health nurse and practice educator at Devon Partnership NHS Trust


• Sun Sander-Jackson, an inclusion lead at Somerset NHS Foundation Trust, Chief Nursing Officer's Black and Ethnic Minority Strategic Advisory Group lead for the Southwest Region, and a Workforce Race Equality Standard expert

For more information about #StayAndThrive visit our futures page at: future.nhs.uk/NEYInternationalRetention

We’d love to keep the conversation going, so please get in touch with questions, comments, stories of your experiences or if have any suggestions about how we can make sure people Stay and Thrive. You can reach us on X, previously known as Twitter, at @stayandthrive, or you can use #stayandthrive. Or, by email at england.stayandthriveir@nhs.net

The Stay and Thrive podcast is a cross regional initiative between NHS England North East and Yorkshire region and NHS England South West region. Follow now so you don’t miss an episode.

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