Inspired To Soar

22/06/2026

Something I want to be intentional about: celebrating progress, even when the work is far from finished.

It's easy, and sometimes right, to focus on the gap between where we are and where we need to be. The urgency is real. The stakes are real.

But if we never pause to name what's changed, we risk burning out on a journey that has no visible milestones.

So let me name a few things:

The Anti-Racist Wales Action Plan exists, and in Wales, that is genuinely significant.

The Seen. Heard. Valued event happened, and those community voices are now on record in a published report.

Healthcare professionals are increasingly showing up for conversations they would have avoided a decade ago.

Organisations are starting to ask harder questions about their data.

None of this is enough. But all of it matters. And the people who made it possible deserve to have that acknowledged.

Keep going, change-makers. The journey is long. But we are not where we were. 💜

20/06/2026

Let's ditch stigma and shame!
If you can't be supportive, at least be kind 🙏🏾.

19/06/2026

A question I get asked often: "Where should we start?"

My answer is always the same: start with an honest assessment of where you actually are.

Not where you'd like to be. Not where your equality policy says you should be. Where you actually are.

That means looking at your patient outcome data, disaggregated by ethnicity. It means asking whether your community engagement has been genuinely co produced or largely consultative. It means examining your workforce demographics, your board composition, and your research participation rates.

The gaps that emerge from that honest assessment become your starting point. Not a curriculum someone else designed for a generic audience.

At Inspired To Soar, this is often where my work with organisations begins: taking a proper look at what is happening before deciding what needs to change.

If your organisation is ready to start that conversation, I'd genuinely love to hear from you.

[email protected] 📩

17/06/2026

I want to be honest about something: a lot of what passes for diversity and inclusion training in the health sector is not good enough.

It's not always the fault of the organisations commissioning it. They're often doing their best with limited budgets and competing priorities. But the result is often training that ticks a box without moving the needle.

In this video, I want to talk about what actually moves the needle. The elements that I've seen and tested that translate into real shifts in how care is delivered.

I also want to talk about what cultural responsiveness training specifically looks like and why it's different from generic equality and diversity training, because the difference matters.

If you're an L&D lead, a training commissioner, or a healthcare leader thinking about how to develop your team in this area, this is for you.

If you'd like to explore what Inspired To Soar's training offer looks like, my contact details are in the comments and my bio.

15/06/2026

I've been thinking about what makes equity training actually work.

Not just leave people feeling informed but actually shift something. Change behaviour. Change culture. Change outcomes.

A few things I've learned:

✅ It has to be grounded in evidence, not just good intentions. People need to understand the data behind the disparities, not just be asked to feel differently about them.

✅ It has to be relevant to the specific context. Generic diversity training often fails because it doesn't connect to the actual systems, structures, and daily decisions of the people in the room.

✅ It has to create psychological safety. People won't engage honestly if they're afraid of saying the wrong thing. A good facilitator makes it safe to be uncomfortable.

✅ It has to lead somewhere. Training that ends in the room doesn't change organisations. There must be a bridge to action, to policy, to practice, to accountability.

This is the standard I hold my work at Inspired To Soar to. And it's what I'd ask you to look for in any training you commission.

If your organisation is ready to take this important step, send an email to: [email protected]

13/06/2026

Looking forward to speaking on this important topic 👍🏾😊.

Meet our speaker, Bami Adenipekun Inspired To Soar , an award-winning author, patient advocate, health equity consultant, and founder of Inspired To Soar, UK. With extensive experience addressing healthcare inequalities and championing meaningful patient involvement, she brings a unique perspective shaped by both professional expertise and lived experience.

Join us on the last day of EAMC 7.0 as she teaches our participants on Addressing the Impact of Stigma in Epilepsy care in LMICs

ROW Foundation Fights Epilepsy The Danny Did Foundation Foundation for People with Epilepsy Epilepsy Warriors Foundation Medical Assistance Sierra Leone Medics For Epilepsy Support & Treatment North Coast Medical Training College Clarke International University Foundation for Epilepsy and Stigma Support - Gambia The Gambia Red Cross Society Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital

12/06/2026

There's a particular kind of courage in speaking up in a clinical setting when you've been dismissed before.

When you've been told your concerns are anxiety. When your pain has been minimised. When you've watched a relative's symptoms be explained away, only to discover later they were the early signs of something serious.

That history lives in the body. It shapes how we enter consulting rooms. It shapes whether we ask the second question, or stay silent.

This is why trust-building in healthcare is so important. It cannot be rushed, assumed, or bypassed. It has to be earned, one interaction at a time, by professionals who show up with genuine respect and a commitment to listening.

For the healthcare professionals reading this: the patient sitting in front of you may be carrying experiences of not being believed. How you meet them, with openness, without assumptions, with patience, matters more than you know.

10/06/2026

This one is a little different.

I want to speak directly to patients today and to the people who love and support them.

When I was diagnosed in 2014, I knew a lot about the healthcare system from a research perspective. My previous patient experiences didn't prepare for the chaos of cancer diagnosis. There are things I wished I had known

You are allowed to ask questions until you understand the answers. You are allowed to request more time. You are allowed to bring someone with you for support. You are allowed to say that something doesn't feel right.

You are not a burden for advocating for yourself. You are exercising your rights.

In this video I share some of what I've learned from my own experience and from years of working alongside patients and communities. I hope it's useful for someone.

Please share this with anyone who is currently navigating a difficult diagnosis or supporting someone who is. 💜

08/06/2026

Nobody should have to fight to be heard within the system that is supposed to care for them.

And yet many people do. Particularly those from ethnic minority backgrounds. Particularly those who don't present in the way the system expects. Particularly those who have had previous experiences of being dismissed, stereotyped, or simply not believed.

I know what this feels like from the inside. And I know what it costs, in emotional energy, in delayed care, and in the quiet but corrosive erosion of trust.

Patient advocacy, the work of supporting people to know and exercise their rights within healthcare, is not a luxury. In an inequitable system, it is a necessity.

But we should never lose sight of the fact that the need for advocacy is itself evidence of systemic failure. The long-term goal is not to train patients to navigate a broken system more effectively. It is to fix the system so that self-advocacy is no longer the price of equitable care.

Both matter. Both are urgent. 💜

03/06/2026

22 years ago, I became a mum. 👶🏾

What should have been a straightforward journey into motherhood came with complications I never saw coming.

My daughter arrived 6 weeks early, and in that vulnerable, frightening space, God sent us a wonderful midwife who held my hand through my caesarean section and stayed with us in the recovery room long after the consultants had gone.

She noticed my daughter's breathing wasn't right when I didn't. That one act of attentiveness from a bank member of staff I was never able to locate afterwards saved my daughter's life. 🙏🏾

There is a part of this story I rarely share.

After I was discharged, whilst my daughter was still in the special care unit, I was home alone and bleeding excessively from a post-op infection. A prompt ambulance response got me to A&E in time. My life was saved.

At that time, Black mothers in the UK were 5 times more likely to die in pregnancy or within 6 weeks of giving birth.

I could have become part of that statistic.

But God. 🤍

My story could have ended very differently; twice over.

The fact that it didn't fills me with a gratitude I cannot put into words.

And it fuels everything I do.

This is why I cannot stay silent about racial health inequities.

This is why I show up, speak up, and keep pushing for change.

Too many lives are at stake, and behind every statistic is a real person, a real family, a real story. 💙

If my experience means anything, let it mean this: prompt care, timely intervention, and having concerns taken seriously should be the norm for every Black mother.

Not the exception.

Not a lottery. 💙

Every Black mother deserves to come home. 🤍