A midwife from Kingston Hospital fractured her elbow when she stopped to help a badly injured cyclist in Richmond Park, days before a meeting with the Prime Minister.

Nora Pearce, 61, was due to meet Gordon Brown at 10 Downing Street the day after she saw a man in his 50s suffer a serious head injury after slipping on ice on Monday morning at about 7.30am.

The hospital’s Unison slipped as she got out of her car and hurt her arm but continued to help another cyclist look after the injured man.

Gordon Brown and Health Secretary Andy Burnham both asked how she ended up in a sling at the reception to launch a new Prime Minister’s commission on nursing on Tuesday.

She said: “When I met the Prime Minister he said ‘Oh, what happened to you?’ “Andy Burnham was very concerned about my arm but I said I’m all right. We were laughing because you’re never off-duty.

“If I had driven on by, nobody would have known I was a nurse but it is in you [to help].”

Kate Grimes, chief executive of Kingston Hospital, said: “We are extremely proud of all our hard working staff that go above and beyond the call of their duty.

“Nora is a prime example of how the caring staff put their patients first.”

Fellow Unison rep Michael Walker said: “Nora would never allow herself to miss an opportunity to put forward the views of Kingston nurses and patients at any forum, let alone the Prime Minister and the chief nurse.

“She’s a great credit to Kingston Hospital and the nursing profession.”

The injured man was taken to Kingston Hospital but Mrs Pearce had not heard what happened to him or been able to identify the other cyclist who stopped first.

She started at Kingston Hospital in 1981 working as a nurse for 12 years before becoming a midwife. She is now semi-retired, doing a couple of shifts a month and spending the rest of the time on Unison work.