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Dr. Michael Tatterton

Clinical Associate Professor

Area
Sch. of Nursing & Healthcare Leadership
Faculty of Health Studies
E-mail
M.Tatterton@bradford.ac.uk
Phone
+441274238057

Biography

Michael is a clinical associate professor of children and young people's nursing at the University of Bradford. He is a children’s nurse, health visitor, independent prescriber and advanced nurse practitioner, and a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.  


In addition to his role at the University, Michael is the Chief Nurse at Bluebell Wood Children's Hospice in Sheffield, and a Specialist Advisor to the Care Quality Commission (CQC).  He is a consultant editor of the journal Nursing Children and Young People (RCNi Publications) and an editor of Evidence-Based Nursing (BMJ Journals).  In September 2021, Michael was appointed to the Board of Trustees of the International Children's Palliative Care Network (ICPCN), representing the World Health Organization European Region.

Michael has extensive clinical, teaching, research and leadership experience.  Prior to joining the University of Bradford, Michael was a consultant nurse in children’s palliative and end of life care in a regional children’s hospice.  He chaired the Yorkshire and Humber Children’s Palliative Care Network Workforce and Education group and sat on the Executive Board, designing and delivering a children’s palliative and end of life care training programme to health, social care and education staff across the region.  He represents children's hospice care nationally in the Association of Chief Children's Nurses. 

Michael has worked as a chief nursing officer, director of nursing, consultant nurse, community specialist practitioner and NHS commissioner.  Michael has worked in the hospital, hospice and community setting, caring for babies, children and young people, and their families in critical care and those with complex and palliative care needs.  In 2010, Michael was awarded the Queen’s Nurse title in recognition of his commitment to children’s community nursing.  Michael is a Florence Nightingale Foundation Leadership Scholar, awarded in 2024. 

Michael has a masters in public health and a PhD in palliative care, where he used interpretative phenomenological analysis to explore how grandparents experience the death of a grandchild.  His research interests include children’s palliative care, family centred care, grief and loss, advancing nursing practice and nursing leadership. He has published and presented his research widely, working in collaboration with practitioners, organisations and academics in other institutions. 

Michael's research has been recognised by numerous awards, including Researcher of the Year (International Journal of Palliative Nursing) and Commitment to Carers (Royal College of Nursing Awards), for his work with bereaved grandparents, and Enhancing Patient Dignity (Nursing Times Awards), for his work on supporting bereaved families of children who donated organs. 

In 2022, Michael was awarded The Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother Award for Outstanding Service Award by the Queen's Institute of Community Nursing 'in recognition of an exceptional contribution made to the individual care of patients in the community to the nursing profession through teaching and personal example and to the body of knowledge through dedicated practice and shared experience.’ 

In 2023, Michael was made a Fellow of the Association of British Paediatric Nurses (ABPN) ‘in recognition of an outstanding contribution as a clinical academic to the care of children, young people and their families through your work in community and palliative care nursing and research.’ 

Michael sits on the Joint Research Board of Together for Short Lives and the Association on Paediatric Palliative Medicine, leading research on palliative care for babies, children, young people, and their families across the UK. He is a member of the Together for Short Lives Advisory Council, which brings together people with professional expertise and lived experience to shape the work of Together for Short Lives and that of the wider children’s palliative care sector.

In 2025, Michael was invited to join the of Commons Health and Social Care Select Committee's Independent Expert Panel for Palliative and End of Life Care. Michael is one of five national experts who will work alongside the core members of the Expert Panel, chaired by Professor Dame Jane Dacre, as it undertakes an evaluation into the state of palliative care in England.

Research

Michael’s research predominantly focuses on the experiences of families of children with life-limiting conditions, and advancing nursing practice in children’s palliative care.  Recent examples include:

  • Dignity Therapy for Children and Young People with Life-Limiting and Life-Threatening Conditions in the UK
  • Identifying the approaches children’s hospices take to providing community-based palliative care
  • Exploring the experience of parents whose baby is diagnosed antenatally with a life-limiting or life-threatening condition
  • Role of children's hospices in the provision of perinatal palliative care
  • Professional experience and perspectives of perinatal advance care planning, using focus groups
  • Prevalence and impact of advanced practice in the children's hospice nursing workforce.
His research interests include family centred care, family nursing, advanced level practice, grief, loss and bereavement, interdisciplinary approaches to care, clinical leadership and innovation in practice, workforce development and qualitative health research.

Current research:
  • Exploring the management of granuloma in children who are enterally fed, by children's community nurses, in partnership with colleagues in Sussex Community NHS Foundation Trust and NHS England
  • Preferred place of death for babies, children and young people who use children's hospice services
  • Dignity Therapy in young adults
  • Perinatal palliative care and families from minority backgrounds.

Teaching

Pre and post registration nursing
Non-medical prescribing
Advanced clinical practice
Palliative care
Family 
Grief, loss and bereavement
Qualitative research methods

Professional activities

Awards (10)

  • Cavell Trust Nursing Award (21 November 2024)
  • Fellow (FABPN) (11 June 2024)
  • Fellow (1 May 2023)
  • Senior Fellowship (SFHEA) (1 January 2023)
  • HM The Queen Mother Award for Outstanding Service Award (1 December 2021)
  • Enhancing Patient Dignity (1 November 2020)
  • Fellowship (FHEA) (1 September 2020)
  • Nurse of the Year: Commitment to Carers (Royal College of Nursing) (1 January 2017)
  • Researcher of the Year (International Journal of Palliative Nursing) (1 January 2016)
  • Queen's Nurse (Queen's Nursing Institute) (1 November 2010)

Committees (6)

  • International Children's Palliative Care Network (ICPCN),
  • University Research Ethics Committee,
  • Together for Short Lives/Association of Paediatric Palliative Medicine (Board Member),
  • Martin House Research Centre, University of York (Research Advisory Board Member),
  • Yorkshire and Humber Children's Palliative Care Network (Chair: Education and Workforce),
  • Health and Social Care Committee, Independent Expert Panel for Palliative and End of Life Care, (3 February 2025)

Consultancy (2)

  • West Yorkshire Integrated Care Board - Independent review into the West Yorkshire out of hours children’s palliative care telephone service (2 September 2024)
  • Care Quality Commission - (1 June 2015)

Journal reviews (9)

  • Nursing Children and Young People - EDITORCHIEF (1 June 2024)
  • Evidence-based nursing - EDITOR (1 July 2023)
  • Journal of Child Health Care - EDITOR (1 March 2021)
  • International Journal of Palliative Nursing - REVIEWER
  • Omega: Journal of Death and Dying - REVIEWER
  • Journal of Advanced Nursing - REVIEWER
  • Nursing children and young people - REVIEWER
  • Palliative Medicine - REVIEWER
  • BMC Palliative Care - REVIEWER

Other activities (1)

  • External Examiner: National University of Ireland, Galway (1 June 2022)

Professional associations (7)

  • Nursing and Midwifery Council, Registrant
  • International Children's Palliative Care Network (ICPCN), Trustee
  • Sigma Theta Tau International Honor Society of Nursing , Nurse Leader
  • Together for Short Lives/Association of Paediatric Palliative Medicine, Board Member
  • International Family Nursing Association (IFNA) UK and Ireland Chapter, Member
  • Association of Chief Children's Nurses, Member
  • Royal College of Nursing, Advanced Level Nursing Credential

Publications

Book (1)

  • Evidence-based practice for nurses, midwives and allied health professionals

    Tatterton, MJ;Fisher, MJ (2026) Elsivier.

Book chapter (9)

  • How to ask the right question

    Tatterton, MJ;Fisher, MJ (2026) Evidence-based practice for nurses, midwives and allied health professionals. In Tatterton, MJ;Fisher, MJ editor(s) Elsivier.

  • Searching literature

    Tatterton, MJ (2026) Evidence-based practice for nurses, midwives and allied health professionals. In Tatterton, MJ;Fisher, MJ editor(s) Elsivier.

  • Using research evidence to make clinical decisions with individual people

    Whaley, V;Fisher, J;Tatterton, MJ (2026) Evidence-based practice for nurses, midwives and allied health professionals. In Tatterton, MJ;Fisher, MJ editor(s) Elsivier.

  • Evidence-based guidelines

    Tatterton, MJ (2026) Evidence-based practice for nurses, midwives and allied health professionals. In Tatterton, MJ;Fisher, MJ editor(s) Elsivier.

  • Evidence synthesis: systematic reviews and meta-syntheses

    Tatterton, MJ (2026) Evidence-based practice for nurses, midwives and allied health professionals. In Tatterton, MJ;Fisher, MJ editor(s) Elsivier.

  • Evidence-Based Practice and Healthcare

    Fisher, MJ;Tatterton, MJ (2026) Evidence-based practice for nurses, midwives and allied health professionals. In Tatterton, MJ;Fisher, MJ editor(s) Elsivier.

  • Do we need nursing models?

    Michael Tatterton and Kieran Manchester (2023) New notes on nursing models. Elsevier.

  • Non-medical prescribing and advanced practice in children's hospices

    Tatterton, M.J. (2021) Medicines Management Toolkit (3rd Ed). Together for Short Lives.

  • Non-medical prescribing

    Tatterton, M.J. and Adams, J (2014) Medicines Management Toolkit (2nd Ed). Together for Short Lives.

Conference contribution (3)

Editorial (1)

Invited papers (1)

  • Stakeholder Perceptions of Dignity Therapy for Children and Young People with Life-Limiting and Life-Threatening Conditions in the UK

    Watts, L., Smith, J., McSherry, W., Tatterton, M.J. and Rodriguez, A. (2020) LIDSEN Publishing Inc..

Non-peer reviewed journal (1)

Other journal (1)

Other publication (2)

Peer reviewed journal (41)