Probation Health Trainers get certification

Heather Lea, Megan Snape, Samantha Bradshaw and Jordan Mayfield, who is also a probation service officer at the PPT, all successfully completed their Probation Health Training. 

The health trainers have been coached by Achieve, a training company commissioned by GMPT. Jane Hughes from Achieve, who trained all four colleagues, also attended the ceremony. 

The qualification they have achieved is a Level 3 certificate in Health Training, a City & Guilds recognised vocational qualification, which they need to be able to practice.

The health trainers offer support with a range of health issues. They help offenders to register with a GP. They can provide prescriptions and arrange appointments for offenders. They link them in with any community services they might need such as mental health, anger management, stress, depression, drink and drug services.

Roz said: “I am delighted to be here to award the certificates that you have all earned for the hard work you have put in.

“I also thank you for letting me have insight into what you do as it helps me improve the quality of our work. We want offenders to succeed, we don’t want them to come back to us. You are really engaging with them to help them do that.”

Heather works at Bury and Middleton. Samantha is based at Oldham office and Megan works at Rochdale and Middleton.

Samantha, has now achieved seven different awards from various schemes. She was also highly commended as an outstanding individual in this year’s GMPT staff awards scheme.

Megan, who attends the Rochdale women’s centre based at Petrus, said: “Probation is fantastic at helping offenders and provides a lot of opportunity to turn their lives around.

“The health trainer scheme is very good at helping people to lose weight, getting them to exercise and to stop smoking and drinking.”

Darrell Thompson, one of the first health trainers to be recruited, attended the ceremony to see his colleagues get their certificates.

He added: “The service has been running for three years and has produced great results. Three reports have been produced and in every single one it was reported that the service is having an effect. Over three years there has been a definite improvement in the health of offenders as a result of the scheme.”