Matron in Chief

CAPTAIN L GIBBON ARRC QHN QARNNS

Captain Lynne Gibbon was educated in Canada where she attended Thomas L. Kennedy High School in Mississauga, Ontario and Lambton College School of Nursing, Sarnia, Ontario.

She joined the Royal Navy as a Nursing Officer in 1979 having qualified as a Registered Nurse in 1974 and undertaken specialist nursing courses in orthopaedics and plastic surgery. Since joining she has served in Royal Naval Hospitals Haslar and Stonehouse and the Ministry of Defence Hospital Unit in Plymouth. She has also served in RN Primary Care establishments at CTCRM Lympstone, HMS Raleigh and JSU Northwood in the UK and abroad in Families Clinics in Gibraltar, Naples and Hong Kong.

Nominated for a Smith & Nephew Scholarship, she conducted research into cold injuries at the US Naval Medical Research Institute in Bethesda, Maryland and field studies with Commando Helicopter Squadron in Norway in 1998.

Commissioned into Queen Alexandra's Royal Naval Nursing Service as a Nursing Officer (Sub Lt) in 1979, she was promoted to Senior Nursing Sister (Lt) in 1981 and Supt NO (Lt Cdr) in 1988. She attended the Initial Staff Course at the Royal Naval Staff College Greenwich in 1994.

Captain Gibbon was a QARNNS Recruiting Officer and Divisional Nurse Manager of the Trauma Directorate in Royal Hospital Haslar. She became the Staff Officer to the Director Defence Nursing Services before being promoted to Commander and was then appointed to the staff of the Medical Director General (Navy) as the QARNNS Appointing Officer and Deputy to the Director Naval Nursing Service.

She was awarded the Associate Royal Red Cross in 2003, and appointed as Director Naval Nursing Service/ Matron-in-Chief QARNNS in July 2003.

Captain Gibbon is single and lives in Gosport. Her hobbies include skiing, sailing and polo.