Faculty of Nursing & Midwifery

This Faculty will endeavour to develop staff that are agile and capable of operating across organisational boundaries, as well as creating a mobile workforce that is skilled and engaged.


Collaborative working practices with partner organisations will be key to the success of this faculty. Our focus is to open up educational pathways for Nurses & Midwives, covering school engagement, employability programmes and Nursing & Midwifery educational programmes.


Faculty Aim:

To improve the outcomes for people that access Health and Social Care across the Integrated Care Partnership in Buckinghamshire.


Faculty Vision:

To create a nursing & midwifery workforce that is competent, knowledgeable, skilled and engaged with high retention and low turnover.

Jan Marote

Nursing & Midwifery Faculty Lead

Jan qualified as a registered nurse in 1984, completing one of the UKs first Nursing degree programmes at Chelsea College, University of London. In a varied career, she spent 16-years away from the NHS in a number of sales and marketing roles, working for a large corporate company, where she developed her business acumen in a target driven competitive environment. A nurse at heart, she returned to the NHS in 2001, undertaking a return to practice programme, before rebuilding her clinical expertise in both surgical and medical areas within the Buckinghamshire Healthcare NHS Trust.


With a passion for making a difference to patient care and recognising the importance and influence of good quality clinical education, Jan joined the Practice Development team within BHT in 2009. During her early years in education, she contributed to the development of the Trust’s Preceptorship Programme and, as a Clinical Skills Educator, to the development and implementation of an array of clinical education programmes and practice standards. She has been instrumental in the growth and innovation of the education, learning and development in Buckinghamshire Healthcare, working in various roles before becoming Assistant Director for Clinical Education in September 2018.

Buckinghamshire System Placements Management

A centralised approach “one-stop shop” for all Buckinghamshire placements:

  • For all learners at all levels, placement hosts, and HEI’s
  • Meant to benefit our future workforce and communities
  • Stemming from themes arising at BHSCA conference
  • Particularly facilitating learners into primary and social care.


Commencement of this project began early 2025; BHT is proposed as the anchor organisation as it has well established structures/processes to support student placement and already manages approx. 680 student placements per quarter. There are systems in place at BHT for Nursing, Midwifery, AHP, Medical, PA, DNs, HVs, Pharmacy Techs, Pharmacy Grads, and T Levels.


This Hub will expand across Acute, Community, Primary and Social Care, and Private & Voluntary. 



Primary Care Knowledge Specialist Project

The Library and Knowledge Service at BHT is proud to continue its Primary Care Knowledge Specialist (PCKS) project

  • Originally part of a 2 year national pilot programme launched by Health Education England in 2021 now extended to March 2025.
  • Proven to be essential in making NHS Library and Knowledge services more accessible to primary care colleagues
  • Continuing to seek funding to be able to extend the service beyond March 2025.
  • For more, email sarah.lewis23@nhs.net
  • Click this link for more information

Nursing Associates Apprenticeship Programme for Social Care Providers across Buckinghamshire

(Click each tab for more info)

What is the programme?

The Nursing Associate (NA) is a new role that is regulated in England by the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC), the body responsible for regulating the nursing and midwifery professions. Nursing Associates will have a level 5 Foundation degree. The Nursing Associate Apprenticeship Programme allows you to develop your staff to become Nursing Associates (or recruit externally if you prefer).


All aspects of learning are undertaken during paid working hours: All apprentices are required to undertake 20% ‘off the job’ learning. For a Nursing Associate Apprentice (NAA) this is generally achieved with one day a week at the university. Additionally, NAAs are required to undertake external placements where they receive direct supervision and have protected learning time in order to develop the competencies required for the role. This means that an NAA on a full-time contract will spend approximately 40% of their working hours not in your workplace. NAAs generally need to be employed for a minimum of 30 hours per week however this may vary between universities. 


Supervision and support during placements: Nursing Associate Apprentices need to be supervised and supported in the workplace in the same way as pre-registration nurse students are supervised and supported. This can be done by a suitably qualified Practice Supervisor but must also have overall support from a Practice Assessor. A practice learning document is supplied by the university which will outline the expectations during the 2 years. It is the role of the Practice Supervisor, working with the Apprentice to set clinical-setting-specific learning goals and assess the apprentices’ competency progression against these goals.  An educational audit of the workplace will be completed by the university prior to accepting Apprentices onto the programme to ensure your organisation has the capacity to provide this support. 


A University Academic Assessor will support your NAA, the Practice Supervisor and Practice Assessor to ensure the planned learning is taking place. Tri-partite reviews will be held between the NAA, the university and you to monitor progress.


Supporting Placements for other Nursing Associates Apprentices: Within the Thames Valley NA partnership, Employers take responsibility for organising external placements for their NAAs with other members of the partnership.  This may result in your organisation hosting TNAs from other employers whilst your NAA is on placement elsewhere. Although this may provide you with some staff support in their absence, they are unlikely to already have experience of your setting and they must not be included in the workplace template for staffing levels.  These Nursing Associate Apprentices will need the same supervision and support described above. 

The Apprenticeship Course

The training costs are funded via the apprenticeship levy and employers can currently receive a support package of £8,000 per Apprentice from HEE or £15,800 for TNAs spending over 50% of their time supporting people with learning disabilities and/or autism.


Entry requirements to train as a Nursing Associate:

(Note: Entry requirements may vary, please check with your University for their specific entry requirements)

1. Level 2 Maths and English qualifications (Functional Skills, GCSE a-c or equivalent)

2. Relevant work experience may be required

3. Demonstration and understanding of the appropriate values and attitudes required of a Nursing Associate

4. Have UK or EU passport or right to work in the UK

5. Evidence of satisfactory DBS and satisfactory completion of occupational health checks by employer (up to date)

6. Understanding of the Nursing Associate role and the Nursing Associate Apprenticeship programme

7. They must have the ability/potential to undertake foundation degree level learning, including practical ability to prioritise learning alongside work and non-work commitments over the 2 years of the apprenticeship 


Further details:

- The course leads to a Level 5 Foundation Degree.

- Runs for 2 years plus 3 months (approx.) for NMC registration and apprenticeship End Point Assessment.

- Includes one day a week plus 675 hours of placements away from the workplace in different settings to meet NMC requirement of gaining experience covering adult, mental health, learning disability and children’s services.

- Placements are usually on a block release model over several weeks at a time.


Benefits of having NAs on the team:

- Increasing capacity of your service to deal with service users’ clinical needs

- They can undertake some tasks currently carried out by a Registered Nurse, freeing up time for the RN to care for your more complex service users

- Potential increase in hospital discharges to your service

- Cost-effective nursing team, working together to maximize skills

- Promoting career progression from care staff towards nursing supports staff retention, as well as attracting good quality staff


Decision Making Checklist

Things to consider when deciding whether to support a staff member to join the Nursing Associate Apprenticeship Training:


1. Does your organisation want to, and have you the capacity to incorporate the new Nursing Associate role into your nursing team in two years’ time?  A CQC statement about this role can be found here

 

2. Do you have a staff member that you feel would be a suitable Nursing Associate after completing the apprenticeship?  If not do you want to recruit someone to support on this apprenticeship?


3. Does the staff member you have in mind meet the entry criteria? Do they have the right experience and values?  You should only support staff you feel will succeed with the training and make excellent Nursing Associates once qualified.


4. Does your organisation have the capacity to support your staff member on the Nursing Associate Apprenticeship programme, remembering that:

   a. You will need to employ them on a full-time basis (or at least 30hrs – check minimum working hours required with your chosen university).

   b. They will attend the university and attend external placements for an average of 40% of their paid working hours (based on 37.5 hours a week employment).

   c. Your Registered Nurse is required to supervise and support your Nursing Associate Apprentice and any other Nursing Associate Apprentices for whom you are providing a placement for.

You can find additional information from Skills for Care about this role here 


What is the salary during training and once registered?

The suggestion would be to keep the senior care worker on their current salary whilst they are in training. You will lose some of their time in learning, but you’ll be gaining their increased skillset. 

In the NHS training nursing associates are generally paid at Band 3 of the NHS Agenda for Change pay scales. 

Once registered and working in the role, Nursing Associates in the NHS are paid at Band 4 of the NHS Agenda for Change pay scales.

Contacts and Useful Links:

If you think you would like to put a staff member forward for the programme, or want to know more please contact: 

Jason Greasley - Jason.greasley1@nhs.net 


University Contacts:


o Buckinghamshire New University, Joanne Bartlett: Joanne.Bartlett@Bucks.ac.uk 


HEE Contacts:


o Claire Wardle – Programme Lead (Nurse Expansion) South East Region, Claire.Wardle@hee.nhs.uk  


Useful Links:


Skills for Care – Nursing Associates

-Films about the nursing associate role

-Training and standards of proficiency 

-Community of practice 


Nursing and Midwifery Council – Nursing Associates

-What is a Nursing Associate?

-How do we regulate the nursing associate profession? 

-Standards for nursing associates 

-Information for employers 

-Nursing associate case studies 


Health Education England – Nursing Associates Case Studies

-Training Nursing Associates 

-Social Care Deep Dive – Evaluation of the Introduction of Nursing Associates (pdf)



Nursing Associate Expansion Project in Social Care (Southeast) Event

hosted online on 12/10/2023


Keynote speeches and the project evaluation report can be found below.

Evaluation Report by Fani Liapi - Senior Research Fellow, University of Bedfordshire


If you wish to receive the full circulation from the day, with all presentations, please request so here

What is genomics?


The first webinar in the series answers everyone’s opening question: What is genomics? And why do nurses, midwives and health visitors need to know about it? And, finally, how will genomics change their practice for the benefit of patients?


Opening remarks by Ruth May, chief nursing officer, NHS England and NHS Improvement.

How is genomics changing healthcare?


The second webinar highlights how genomics is already being used in healthcare to bring benefit to patients, including some real-life examples and patient stories from nursing and midwifery practice.


Opening remarks by Professor Jacqueline Dunkley-Bent, chief midwifery officer, NHS England and NHS Improvement.

Genomics: It’s my time to learn!


The third webinar looks at how nurses, midwives and healthcare visitors are being upskilled to support genomic medicine, including examples of how to help get them up to speed with what they need to know for their own practice.



Opening remarks by Professor Mark Radford, chief nurse, HEE.

Health Care Assistants'

Staff Stories

HCA Staff Stories:

Matthew Carpenter

ODP Theatres Wycombe 

HCA Staff Stories:

Heidi Beddall

Head of Midwifery Women's & Children's Services

HCA Staff Stories:

Kirsty Morris

Matron for Cardiovascular Medicine Wycombe

HCA Staff Stories:

Kym Northeast

ODP Theatres Wycombe