Patient safety could be threatened by plans to ‘water down’ training for nurses

The Nursing and Midwifery Council has Plans is pressing ahead with plans to simplify specialist nurse training across the UK despite nursing leaders warning it poses “huge risks” to patient safety. The proposals are to have only generic standards across the five specialisms, leaving all of the knowledge and skills for the specific qualifications for universities to decide themselves. It will even allow universities to choose how long the courses should be and how much time nurses should spend on placements.

He said: “The changes being proposed by the Nursing and Midwifery Council will lead to a watering down of the educational and training standards of these specialist professionals. If courses are developed unilaterally by universities, as an employer I will have no idea if the district nurse is competent to undertake the role I am recruiting them to do.”

Full story in the Independent, 8 August 2021