HSJ Awards 2014: Workforce

Health Education Yorkshire and the Humber: Advanced training practice scheme

The judges said: “This team has built a sustainable platform and infrastructure that has seen successful planning and provides for future workforce change.”

Created as a model to promote entry of nurses into general practice, the advanced training practice scheme created a shift in career aspirations.

The scheme has provided student nurses with accredited high quality placements attached to practice nurse teams covering years one, two and three of their training.

Audits show a shift from 30 per cent of student nurses considering practice nursing as a first career choice prior to GP placement, to 88 per cent after placement. An increasing number of practices have employed students directly on qualification.

With a region-wide footprint of 100 participating practices, the scheme has seen a growth in the number of nurses going through it, and now generates 200 placements a year.

Of those who have graduated since going through the training scheme, more than 10 per cent have been employed directly into practice nurse roles in general practice.

The scheme has also created a mentor course and workshops for the many expert practice nurses who have no teaching experience. This has aided their growth as primary care nurse educators, improving their job satisfaction and professional development.

Other finalists’ projects:

• Nottinghamshire’s Community Programme in partnership with Nottingham CityCare Partnership – Better training and a new clinical quality framework for care homes
• Health Education East Midlands – Responding to the workforce challenge by equipping nurses for general practice
• Health Education England – The talent for care project
• Health Education England with East Kent Hospitals University Foundation Trust – Establishing hot ‘emergency-based’ and cold ‘ward-based’ teams to enhance the trainee experience, improving patient care at weekends
• Hull and East Yorkshire Hospitals Trust – Success through people
• Leicestershire Partnership Trust – Co-ordinated community health services
• Norfolk and Norwich University Hospitals Foundation Trust – NHS Apprentices: changing a workforce by raising aspiration and providing opportunity
• North Tees and Hartlepool Foundation Trust – Apprenticeships in care enhance patient experience, quality and safety and reduce costs.
• Worcestershire Health and Care Trust - Developing an effective workforce