Chief Nurse

Go back Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital NHS Trust

The closing date is 22 March 2026

The Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital NHS Trust (RNOH) is seeking to appoint an exceptional Chief Nurse at an important moment in the Trust’s development.

RNOH is a place with a proud heritage, a distinctive clinical mission and a deeply committed workforce. It is equally a Trust looking ahead determined to strengthen clinical leadership, modernise services and continue delivering outstanding specialist care for the patients who rely on it.

The coming years will be both exciting and challenging. The Trust is entering a period of significant transformation as it optimises its electronic health record, redesigns pathways of care and aligns the way it works to the three major shifts set out in the NHS Long Term Plan. Improving quality, safety, productivity and value simultaneously will require ambition, curiosity, resilience and compassionate leadership, and clinical executives who can bring people with them and translate strategy into better care on the ground.

This post sits at the heart of that agenda.

As Chief Nurse, you will play a central role in shaping the future of the organisation, strengthening quality and safety, and leading trust-wide clinical transformation  a key member of the Board and Executive Team, you will provide visible, professional and corporate leadership across nursing and care delivery, working alongside experienced executive colleagues with the full commitment of the Board to modernising services in a way that genuinely benefits patients and staff.

For a confidential discussion, please contact Hunter Healthcare.

RNOH is the largest orthopaedic hospital in the UK and a global leader in our field.

We provide a dynamic working environment where we support frontline staff to implement improvements so that we can realise our vision of being a world-leading neuro‑musculoskeletal (MSK) hospital providing the best patient care and staff experience in the NHS, delivering world‑leading research, and offering a strong foundation of education, training and career progression.

Our dedicated staff come from diverse backgrounds, and our patients benefit from the wide range of experience they bring to the Trust. The RNOH brings unrivalled expertise together in one place allowing us to deliver some of the world’s most complex and innovative care to our patients.

• Rated Good by the CQC
• Recognised in the Newsweek survey as the 15th best orthopaedic hospital in the world and the best in the UK
• Consistently highly ranked for patient experience
• Amongst the best staff experience of any organisation in London as measured by the NHS staff survey
• Two primary sites, one in Stanmore and one in central London; the Stanmore site which is the largest site also has the Stanmore Building, a state‑of‑the‑art inpatient facility
• With an exciting strategy, with a focus on innovation in the delivery of MSK healthcare, prevention and enabling patients to live longer lives with less disability

The Chief Nurse is the professional head of nursing and a full unitary member of the Trust Board, with corporate accountability for the quality, safety and experience of care provided by the organisation.

The post holder is responsible for ensuring the delivery of safe, effective, compassionate and evidence‑based care, supported by high standards of professional practice, workforce capability and clinical governance.

The Chief Nurse leads the organisation’s approach to quality improvement, patient experience, clinical effectiveness and patient safety, working in partnership with the Chief Medical Officer and the wider executive team.

The Chief Nurse provides strategic leadership for the development and modernisation of nursing and care delivery, ensuring that services are designed around patient outcomes and experience. This includes leadership of innovation in care pathways, adoption of digital technologies, and redesign of clinical models to enable more responsive, efficient and personalised care.

The role holds executive responsibility for a number of statutory and regulatory…