Salford staff and students attend annual commemoration service at Westminster Abbey

Salford student nurses Emily Pickup and Jamie Leigh Line attended a students’ day prior to the service. This included networking opportunities, an expert panel of guest speakers across an array of nursing and midwifery professions and workshops on preceptorship and practice learning. They had the opportunity to share ideas and help to shape future NMC standards and guidelines and listen to an empowering talk on how to speak up as students and new qualified nurses and midwives.

On the day of the commemoration service, they attended Westminster Abbey with University staff Paul Kadugu Gnanaprakasam, Mental Health Nursing Lecturer, and Liz Howey, Teaching Learning Fellow on the Nursing Associate Programme.

Emily said: “I was so excited to attend the service; it was absolutely stunning inside the Abbey, a true once in a lifetime experience with powerful messages and time for reflection throughout. It made me realise just how important nursing and health professions are to our community and country and the unity and privilege that come from helping people in their most vulnerable times. I'll never forget the sound of the choir travelling through the Abbey, while being surrounded by such inspiring nursing colleagues.”

The service, which took place on International Nurses’ Day, Monday 12 May 2025, has been held annually at Westminster Abbey since 1965. It has global significance to the nursing and midwifery community, who come together to give thanks and to celebrate nurses and midwives everywhere who continue Florence Nightingale’s legacy.

Central to the commemoration service is the Lamp. Florence Nightingale was known as ‘The Lady with The Lamp’ as she made her rounds at night tending to the soldiers wounded in the Crimean War.

A scholar of the Florence Nightingale Foundation carries the Lamp with two escorts as it is processed in the Abbey. Student nurses follow, signifying the transfer of knowledge to future generations of nurses and midwives.

A procession of the Nurses’ Roll of Honour is carried and escorted by the Military Matrons in Chief to honour Commonwealth Nurses killed during the Second World War. In 2022, an additional Roll of Honour was processed to remember nurses, midwives, nursing associates and healthcare support workers who died during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Liz Howey, one of the academics who attended, said: “As a nurse, standing in that historic space among fellow professionals was deeply moving. The service was a powerful reminder of our shared calling—to care, to lead, and to serve with compassion and integrity. Listening to the readings, music, and tributes to Florence Nightingale's enduring legacy filled me with renewed pride and purpose. It was a humbling experience that reaffirmed why we do what we do, and how vital our role remains in shaping the future of healthcare.”