17/06/2026
Today is National Healthcare Estates & Facilities Day - and we're celebrating our staff and teams by shining a spotlight on the vital contributions of these roles.
Porters are the backbone of our hospitals. They collect bloods, transport patients to scans, take meals onto the wards, and a whole lot more in between. Without them, we would not be able to function properly.
Did you know across the Group, our porters completed a staggering 582,600 tasks in the last financial year?! That’s 207,465 at Northern Lincolnshire and Goole NHS Foundation Trust and 375,135 at Hull University Teaching Hospitals NHS Trust.
We spent some time on shift with Dominic (Dom) O’Brien Fernandez at Scunthorpe to see what the job of a porter is really like.
Alison McCulley, Logistics Coordinator, explained our porters complete 850 to 1,000 patient moves a week at Scunthorpe. That’s a lot of steps!
Anyone who’s ever stepped foot in Scunthorpe General Hospital will know its split in two – the Church Lane side and the Cliff Gardens side. This inevitably adds on a lot more walking time, especially for our porters – something I found out the hard way!
First up, Dom and I went to Ward 16 to collect some patient bloods. A lot of people probably don’t realise porters complete this extremely important task on a daily basis. These were ready to collect from the nurses’ station, and we took them to the Discharge Lounge. At the end of discharge, porters use the pod system for small loads of samples, and walk to the Path Lab with bigger samples.
We then headed over to Ward 24 for a booked patient move. However, this had to be cancelled upon arrival due to illness. The nature of our hospitals means this can sometimes happen, as was the case with another patient where these was some confusion over whether a scan was needed.
It was straight over to Ward 27 to transport an elderly patient for an X-ray. The patient needed to be put on a bed. This is where Dom’s training comes in, as they need to make sure the patient is safely moved. No sooner have we dropped this patient off, we’re off to ED to collect another patient for a CT scan.
Finishing up my time with Dom, we took some hot locks (patient meals on wheels) down to the wards. These need to be delivered in time for lunch. It’s no easy task as the hot locks are very heavy and bulky, so transporting them can be tricky. Luckily, the lifts are a porter’s best friend, especially in cases like this!
After spending just a few hours with Dom, I was in awe of just how much work our porters do. I was also impressed at how they go about their shift with a quiet grace. Humble, hardworking, and always on hand to help. We truly would be lost without them. They’re the heroes behind the scenes. So next time you see a porter walking by, say hello or give them a quick wave. I’m sure it’ll make a big difference to them.
