Sara Hollins

Director of Midwifery, Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust

Sara knew she wanted to be a midwife from a very early age after being inspired by the community midwife who attended the birth of her youngest sister at home in Pontefract.  Very few places were offering Midwifery as a direct entry option in the early 1990’s, so she embarked on one of the last traditional RGN training courses at Manchester Royal Infirmary, qualifying as a nurse in November 1993.

She briefly worked as a staff nurse on the neurosurgical ward at Pinderfields before being interviewed by the same community midwife, now a lecturer, to commence her midwifery training at Airedale and Bradford in 1994.

Qualifying as a midwife in 1995, Sara spent the first few years as a rotational midwife at Airedale, but a passion and interest in intrapartum care led to a long career as a labour ward co-ordinator and then labour ward manager.

After 20 years at Airedale, Sara moved to Harrogate as Head of Midwifery, spending 2 ½ years there before moving to Bradford.

Now in her 7^th year at Bradford, Sara is committed to providing and developing a maternity service that meets the needs of a diverse and complex population, with a strong focus on reducing inequalities to improve outcomes for birthing people and their babies.  This was recognised in 2021, when she was awarded the Chief Midwifery Officer Gold Award, for her leadership in this area.

Sara is currently a West Yorkshire Improving Population Health, Health Inequalities Fellow

Outside of work, Sara has 3 grown up children, 2 step-children and 2 dogs, and is usually found on the fells or up a hill somewhere with her husband.