“I’m proud of my Tillotts IBD STARS Award … but ultimately, the patients are the real winners”
Michael Cervantes, recipient of the Richard Driscoll Award in 2022, shares his career experience and impact from receiving the award.
The recipient of the Richard Driscoll Award at the Tillotts IBD STARS Event 2022 was Michael Cervantes, an IBD Clinical Nurse Specialist at St Mark’s Hospital. Michael’s dedication to serving his patients is such that, even though the award was a career highlight, he accepted it by video link to avoid cancelling a clinic.
Throughout his career, Michael has always seen patients as “real people with real lives, fears and anxieties who need reassurance and a personalised approach to care from the healthcare professionals looking after them”. This fundamental philosophy shines through in his award-winning project.
A childhood dream: to be a nurse in the NHS.
Michael dreamed of becoming an NHS nurse when he was growing up in the Philippines in the province of Cebu, and his dream came true when he joined the NHS in 2014.
In August 2017, Michael chose to specialise as an IBD Clinical Nurse Specialist at St Mark’s Hospital in Middlesex. Here he was introduced to the Tillotts LOGIC Education programme, which is designed to help IBD nurses develop their skills for everyday practice, as part of the company’s mission to improve care for people with gastrointestinal (GI) diseases.
Over the next four years, Michael completed all seven Tillotts LOGIC Education modules. He feels that the programme helped him develop the skills to build his award-winning project called ‘IBD Service Link’ (ISL), designed to improve the IBD patient experience.
The ‘IBD Service Link’ idea came from seeing IBD patients facing delays for surgery.
ISL was inspired by seeing patients facing delays for elective surgery. As well as breaching the IBD UK Standards ‘to perform elective surgery for IBD as soon as clinical status has been optimised and within 18 weeks of referral’1, Michael was concerned about the emotional impact that these delays were creating for his patients: ‘real people, with real lives’.
Michael organised a bi-weekly meeting with relevant stakeholders – a proactive approach to identifying IBD patients at risk of deterioration whilst on waiting lists, effectively demonstrating the safety-critical role of the ISL. ISL was established when COVID restrictions meant that the clinical prioritisation had to be done through phone calls between the specialist nurses and their patients.
Michael organised a bi-weekly meeting with relevant stakeholders – a proactive approach to identifying IBD patients at risk of deterioration whilst on waiting lists, effectively demonstrating the safety-critical role of the ISL. ISL was established when COVID restrictions meant that the clinical prioritisation had to be done through phone calls between the specialist nurses and their patients.
Introducing new treatment pathways requires a different set of skills.
Whilst Michael possesses a wealth of clinical expertise in his field, introducing new treatment pathways in the NHS requires a completely different set of skills.
Tillotts LOGIC helped Michael get ISL off the ground.
A particular Tillotts LOGIC module he cited in helping him gain agreement for ISL is ‘Crafting and Presenting a Compelling Business Case’ as numerous key stakeholders in the Trust were involved in signing off the initiative.
Positive patient feedback was paramount in measuring success.
The initial stakeholder feedback for the ISL has been very positive. But given the project’s aim of enhancing patient experience, affirmative patient feedback has been considered paramount in the evaluation process. One patient captured the essence of this project: “I was really in a dark place and just by having you there to try to help and go out of your way really seemed to speed up my treatment plan.”
Next steps for IBD Service Link at St Mark’s.
The project has already improved the delivery of IBD surgery and management to the degree that the IBD team will use preliminary outcomes and experience as part of the business case for a full-time IBD Surgical Nurse. This would be a specialist embedded in the IBD service who can become more involved with pre- and post- operative counselling, developing pathways including Enhanced Recovery After Surgery, and running a post-operative clinic for patients who have undergone ileo-colonic resection. Other hospitals are considering adopting the ISL model to improve their own services.
What next for Michael?
Michael explained the significance of receiving the Tillotts LOGIC IBD STARS Richard Driscoll Award in 2022 for his innovative ISL project. He credits the award with helping him gain a career development secondment as a Transformation Fellow. The role involves supporting successful applicants to strengthen their skills in project delivery, facilitating change, strategy and analysis, and broadening their experience across a range of services and functions. He also now sits on the Tillotts LOGIC IBD STARS steering committee.
The role involves supporting successful applicants to strengthen their skills in project delivery, facilitating change, strategy and analysis, and broadening their experience across a range of services and functions. He also now sits on the Tillotts LOGIC IBD STARS steering committee.
Tillotts LOGIC educational programme
Tillotts LOGIC is an award-winning educational programme initiated and funded by Tillotts Pharma UK Ltd that provides dedicated training, education and support initiatives for healthcare professionals working in IBD.
Courses are designed and delivered by IBD nurses and trainers in the form of seven practical weekend courses across the UK covering a range of topics suitable for both newly appointed and experienced IBD nurses.
The LOGIC programme forms part of Tillotts’ commitment to the NHS and enables GI professionals to collaboratively develop their skills for every day practice, as part of the Tillotts Pharma mission to help improve the lives of people with IBD.
Organised and funded by Tillotts Pharma UK & Ireland, intended for UK & Ireland healthcare professionals. Some of this educational content may contain reference to Tillotts products. PU-03123 | April 2026
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