THE AMAZING work of health and care professionals was the focus of the judging day for the South Wales Argus Health and Care Awards.

The awards were launched to celebrate inspirational and dedicated workers in the health and care industry. With 15 categories to choose from the awards aim to reflect the range of work done by those working within these sectors and organisations providing services.

Hundreds of nominations were sent for people from all over the region for the 5 award categories.

The categories are GP Practice of the Year, Health Care Professional of the Year, Early Years Award, Healthy Neighbourhood Award, Best Patient and Public Involvement Award, Volunteer of the Year, Third Sector or Community Team of the Year, Mental Health Team of the Year, Hospital Team of the Year, Health Campaign of the Year, Best Innovation Award, Research Impact Award, Together we Achieve Award, Outstanding Achievement Award and the Innovative Care in the Care Home Sector Award.

The panel of judges met at St Joseph’s Hospital on Monday to create a shortlist for each category from the nominations received. The nominations were considered for their merits as finalists in the category.

Anyone with prior knowledge or a connection to any of the nominees was excluded from voting in that category.

The judging panel for the awards consisted of Fiona Davies from St Joseph’s Hospital, Gareth Lloyd from St Johns College, Rachael Barnett from Malmo Hearing, Gail Greaves from Wales and West Utilities, Robin Craine from Chepstow Racing & Events, Stephen McMillan from Health and Care Research Wales, Brian Medhurst from the Freemasons of Monmouth, Denise Llewellyn from the Royal College of Nursing in Wales, Cllr Mark Whitcutt from Newport Council and Matt Hickman from The Rutherford Cancer Centres (Proton Partners International), Nicole Garnon and Hussain Bayoomi from the South Wales Argus.

The finalists will be contacted in the coming days and then invited to attend a special presentation event at Chepstow Racecourse which will be held on October 19 where the winners will be announced.

They will also be featured in upcoming editions of the South Wales Argus in the run-up to the awards.

South Wales Argus editor Nicole Garnon said: “It was very difficult to choose between the people nominated for our Health and Care Awards. We had an enjoyable day with the judges choosing our finalists.

“We look forward to celebrating and promoting the achievements of people who work in these fields. I am looking forward to meeting the finalists and finding out more about the amazing done work by individuals and organisations.”

Fiona Davies, business development director at St Joseph’s Hospital said the awards recognise the outstanding work done in the sector. She said: “Health care professionals in both the NHS and private health care sector do a fantastic job of delivering an excellent standard of care to patients every day, but we often don’t think about the hard work that goes into achieving that.

“Without the dedication of our health care professionals we wouldn’t have access to services we rely on to stay healthy and ensure that we all experience a good quality of life.”

Hussain Bayoomi, managing director of the South Wales Argus, added: “There is outstanding work, care, innovation and services, across the health sector and it is important to focus on the people who have worked so hard and to tell their stories.”

To find out more about the awards visit southwalesargus.co.uk/healthandcareawards.