Happy Retirement Anne!

LDC Colleagues at goodbye meal for Anne Rodger’s retirement

Tuesday 13 June colleagues from across DESMOND and the Leicester Diabetes Centre got together to wish Anne Rodgers, DESMOND Trainer & Assessor, a very happy retirement after 20 years of service! Read on to hear from Anne about her time with DESMOND:

“My name is Anne Rodgers and I have been involved with the DESMOND programme for 20 years.

Initially I was working as a diabetes dietitian in Northumberland delivering Type 2 patient education groups alongside practice and district nurses in the area. I was fortunate to be in the right place at the right time to became one of the first educators to be trained in the Newly diagnosed module back in 2003. I took part in the pilot and RCT and then, again, luckily was trained as a trainer and assessor in the module. I was part of the original northern team but ended up travelling all over the UK and Southern Ireland. I learned so much from other educators and this developed my skills over the years.

The extent of my travels as a trainer broadened when I had the opportunity to visit Perth in Australia three times to train educators and then trainers and assessors, what a privilege to do that work. The highlight of my career with the programme however, took me to Africa- Malawi and Maputo, where it was my honour to teach some patients the programme and then train several educators as part of the EXTEND study.

Finally in my last two/three years, because of COVID ,I was thrown into the scary world of virtual everything! That felt both hard and challenging but taught me many more skills.

My decision to retire was an easy one as I feel I have achieved some amazing things over the last 20 years. I have trained and accredited hundreds of educators, met some of my best friends and had a lot of fun and laughs along the way.

In my retirement I plan to see more of family and friends, explore the beautiful Northumberland coast and the rest of the world more, join a choir and do some befriending of some elderly local people- anyone who knows me is aware of how much I love to talk!!!

Thank you DESMOND for everything, I will miss you.”