A group of nurses who arrived from the Philippines in 2001 are marking 25 years of caring for patients in Hartlepool and Stockton, with several members of the original intake still working for the local NHS.
They came to Teesside through a national recruitment intended to fill nursing . What was expected to be a short stay became a life here for many of the nurses, who built careers, raised families and continued working across University Hospital of Hartlepool and University Hospital of North Tees.
From Hartlepool critical care to matron
Maria Antonette Baldonasa, known to colleagues as Monette, was among the first group. She left the Philippines in September 2001, leaving her husband and two young daughters behind while she began work in Hartlepool’s former critical care department.
She later brought her family to the area and is now matron in the critical care unit at North Tees. Recalling her arrival, she said the Hartlepool team made her feel “valued, supported and cared for”. She described that welcome as central to overcoming homesickness and developing her career.
Two-year plans became family lives
Arlizel Estrellado also expected her Teesside posting to last two years. She worked in Hartlepool before becoming a specialist bowel cancer screening practitioner at North Tees. She now has three children here and regards the area as home.
Her memories of the early days include nurses gathering at a phone box at 2am to call relatives in the Philippines, working around the time difference before mobile phones were part of everyday life. Alongside the practical challenges, she remembers managers and colleagues providing close support as the group settled into unfamiliar hospitals and communities.
Mylene Baran, now a nurse in the stroke unit at North Tees, tells a similar story. She had also planned to stay for two years. A quarter of a century later, she has two children who see Teesside as home, while family visits keep their connection with the Philippines.
A milestone with wider meaning
The nurses recently gathered for a celebration evening marking the anniversary. The Trust has not published the original cohort size, the number still employed locally or the date and attendance for the event, so the milestone should not be read as a complete account. It is, however, a documented record of three long careers and the families built alongside them.
North Tees and Hartlepool NHS Foundation Trust says it employs close to 5,500 and non-clinical staff and serves around 400,000 people across Hartlepool, Stockton-on-Tees and parts of County Durham. Its two main hospitals are the same sites where the nurses began their Teesside careers.
International recruitment remains part of NHS workforce planning, although the rules and support structures have developed since 2001. Current NHS England guidance says recruitment should be ethical and nurse-centred, with effective induction plus pastoral and professional support. The experiences described by Monette, Arlizel and Mylene show why that welcome matters long after a contract is signed.
The anniversary is not only about length of service. It records the personal decisions behind local healthcare: leaving children and partners, adapting to a different country, and eventually choosing to stay. For these nurses, a temporary move became 25 years of work, family life and care on Teesside.