A former Sutton woman has been nominated for the Gold Awards for Further Education Alumni 2008.

Justine Whitaker last year was named the Nursing Standard's Nurse of the Year and won the Innovation in Cancer Award, sponsored by the Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust. Now Craven College has nominated her for the gold awards, which are given to former college students who have since gone on to achieve excellence.

Justine left school in 1986 with no formal qualifications and began her career working in a local nursing home where colleagues told her she would make a good nurse.

She decided to return to education and went to Craven College, in Skipton.

She initially took an office studies course, but soon realised that her future did not lie in that field. The following year she joined the pre-nursing course, gaining five O-levels in just nine months, and she was awarded the Student of the Year title at Craven College in 1988. After leaving Craven College, Justine started her nurse training at St James's Hospital, in Leeds, where she specialised in lymphology, achieving specialist qualifications.

Working closely with her patients, she also invented a new type of garment to relieve painful swelling in patients with prostate cancer, which is now used nationwide.

Justine is currently in her final year of study for a Masters degree in the management of lymphoedema at Bradford University - the only course of its kind in the world - and is a senior lecturer in lymphoedema management at the University of Central Lancashire.

She has also started her own specialist independent nursing clinic.