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You will see on the site an article on the recruiting nurses on Channel S, a national Bengali/English cable channel.  As a panel member I had the chance to hear from callers to the programme and to speak at length to the two nurses from Bangladeshi backgrounds that we asked to speak on the show.

From a personal point of view it was fascinating to see how a bi-lingual TV show works. I was impressed with how presenter Khasruz Zaman had to keep viewers with mainly English or mainly Bengali informed with lots of paraphrasing, whilst still keeping the flow going.

What was interesting to me was that the questions were largely the same as for any community - what were the entry requirements, why didn't my grand daughter get in, are there fees to pay etc.  From the faith perspective there did not seem to huge resistance to the Iman Mardani's strong endorsement of the need for Muslims to enter the profession.  Ward Sister Nahar (whose photo is on the website) wore her uniform on the show and this was a graphic illustration of the adaptions the NHS has made to accommodate Muslim women who need to meet religious requirements.

This is a innovative approach for the NHS to try to crack this problem.  We have had over 100 enquiries so far and we expect to see a rise in applications to nursing training as a result.

I came away with the impression that the main issue is one of critical mass. Whereas many other communities have a strong awareness of nursing as a career (for example my sister is a nurse), the Bangladeshis have so few people in this area it is not on their radar as a career choice.  This is even more criminal given the high rates of unemployment in this community.  Although we have focussed on the deficit of Bangladeshis there is relative lack of take up across Tower Hamlets, so hopefully this will help the wider campaign.

The show is attracting a fair bit of mainstream media interest, which we will report on in due course along with some clips from the show.