The end of an era at St Luke's Hospital

After 12 years at the helm, we are sad to inform you that our Chief Executive Richard Burden will be retiring this year.

Richard writes:

"It has been an exciting time and with the help of our loyal and excellent staff team and the patience of our understanding patients we have achieved much together in bringing St Luke’s into the 21st century.

It seems long ago that we started by replacing the brown lino in the corridors with vinyl and changing the colours of the walls. We opened the coffee shop and increased the size of our rehabilitation team. In 2016 we started planning for and then building a new second floor whilst still running the hospital fully occupied below. Every bedroom had a large wet room and we gained an activities room, sitting room, dining room, garden room, training/meeting room, spa bathroom, staff room and more. We also have an array of solar panels on the roof.

Not content with that we moved patients to the new floor from one wing, so that we could convert small bedrooms into large ones with wet rooms, added two more over Reception and converted two smaller bedrooms into a large double with wet room. Two more small bedrooms became a staff room and hairdressing salon.

Technology has been introduced along the way. We were one of the first homes to go digital with our care planning and medications. We have Wi-Fi throughout supporting this and our call bell and acoustic monitoring systems and the new rooms have a misting system to put out a fire should one occur, not to mention smart TV’s.

Of course, now we had 28 bedrooms with ensuite wet rooms, everyone expected one, so we then started to enlarge ensuite bathrooms to fit wet rooms through all the bedrooms large enough to allow this – yet more disruption for our wonderful staff team and understanding patients to put up with. We now have 50 bedrooms with ensuite wet rooms.

We are very fortunate to have the support of our excellent trustees along the way. Not only in planning and developing, but in fundraising. It is largely through their endeavours that over £1.5 million has been raised over the past eight years towards the projects mentioned above, and they are pressing on. We have been able to refurbish and equip the Physio Gym, add a new assisted bath and refurbish the bathroom on the ground floor and have just completed the refurbishment of the kitchen on the first floor. More improvements are planned. I would like to express my personal thanks to the trustees on behalf of all of us.

I should also mention our clinics. Their support over the disruptions has also been invaluable and the rental of the rooms to them provides us with any surplus enabling us to charge our fees at cost price.

My thanks also go to my management team who support me and our staff. We have exceptionally low turnover compared to other homes and many staff have been here over 20 years. It is often mentioned how friendly and welcoming our team are. That it is a good place to work as well as a good place to receive care in is part due to the staffing levels which are also higher than in most care homes. My hope is always that we can all go home each day knowing that what we have done that day makes a difference, as that is where job satisfaction comes from.

It is my intention to stay until my successor is in place and I know that you will give him or her the support that you have given me over the years."

Simon Polito, Chair of Trustees commented:

At the end of July we will be saying goodbye to Richard Burden who has decided that it is time for him to retire after twelve years as our Chief Executive.  St Luke’s has been very fortunate to benefit from Richard’s exceptional leadership skills and personal qualities through some very challenging times, as well as from his broad knowledge and experience of the care sector and his contacts within it.  As well as guiding St Luke’s successfully through Covid, Richard has overseen a remarkable period of transformation at St Luke’s, including most notably the building of our new second floor.  Fittingly his service to the care industry over a long and distinguished career was recognised recently by a special award at the Oxfordshire Care Awards.