Pulse won two awards at the prestigious BSME Talent awards last night for our coverage of the recruitment crisis and the abuse faced by GPs among other reporting.
Senior reporter Eliza Parr won B2B writer of the year, and Eliza and senior reporter Anna Colivicchi won best use of data journalism for their analysis of the Government’s GP recruitment plans.
Eliza joined Pulse in February 2023, and this is her first job in journalism. Her entry highlighted her work on GP abuse, where she spoke to over 20 GPs and staff about abuse they had faced from patients. They told her how they had suffered mental health problems due to patients comparing them to Nazis, blaming them for the death of a relative, or threatening them with physical violence.
It also cited her work on scrutinising GMC cases, including the doctor who was struck off the medical register because he was unable to respond to their attempts to contact him as he was working in war-torn Sudan with no form of communication.
Anna and Eliza’s scrutinising of the Government’s workforce plans involved a detailed look into every stage of a GP career, and when they are most likely to leave the profession. It also revealed the shortfall in GP training capacity.
The judges wrote about Eliza: ‘In her first role in journalism, Eliza’s skilful reporting and command of data-driven storytelling resonated with her audience and caught the eye of the judges. A star in the making, she shone through in a hotly contested category.’
They wrote about Anna and Eliza’s entry: ‘Anna and Eliza took a challenge faced by millions of Britons every day – getting a GP appointment – and dug into the numbers to explain why the UK public in underserved in a thorough and compelling way. Their work successfully brought to life a piece of work that could help to shape government policy.’
Earlier this month, Anna was highly commended in the 30 to Watch journalism awards, which are run by the MHP Group and recognise some of the best young talent in the media.
She was highly commended in the health category for three pieces: the first revealing that a major Essex hospital trust had discovered a backlog of around 30,000 patient documents which it failed to deliver to local GP practices; the second from the cover feature of Pulse in July 2023, looking at why there seemed to be a shortage of GPs despite the numbers trained being higher than ever; and the third was another exclusive, showing leaked messages from GP negotiators at the BMA, which revealed that public pronouncements around strike action were misleading.
Pulse editor Jaimie Kaffash said: ‘This is a richly deserved award, and it is great that Eliza and Anna’s hard-hitting reporting has been recognised in this way. We are committed to leading the agenda on the issues that matter for GPs, whether that be plans for same-day access, the GP recruitment and employment crises, or the abuse faced by practice staff and we are only able to do this due to the talent within the team.
Congratulations Eliza and Anna.
Congratulations!
Congratulations