Nursing & Midwifery Council commissions nursing research
Professor Peter Griffiths and Dr Sarah Robinson of the National Nursing Research Unit (NNRU) at the Florence Nightingale School of Nursing & Midwifery at King’s have been commissioned by the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) to analyse the potential risks and benefits relating to the regulation of healthcare support workers in the UK.
Healthcare support workers (HCSWs) and their equivalents provide direct services related to patient care and treatment and support the work of registered nurses and midwives. However there is currently no statutory provision for the regulation of the estimated one million HCSWs working in the UK.
Peter Griffiths and Sarah Robinson will analyse the risks and issues presented to public protection by unregulated HCSWs. Their findings will support the NMC in determining what, if any, action it should take to protect the public through the regulation of these roles. Within the research Peter and Sarah will consider the implications for practitioners, including HCSWs and the way in which nurses delegate to them, across the UK working in the NHS and any other settings or forms of health care. The roles of regulators, employers and the potential impact on individuals will be considered. It is anticipated that Peter and Sarah will present their report to the NMC’s Executive Management Board by spring 2010.
Commenting on the commissioning of the research, NMC Chief Executive and Registrar, Professor Dickon Weir-Hughes said: “The regulation of health care support workers operating below the level of registered nurses and midwives continues to raise questions regarding public protection. This is likely to increase as more and more activities previously undertaken by nurses and midwives are devolved to this, unregulated part of the workforce. It is a concern that someone who has been struck off the register as, for example, a nurse working in a care home can potentially continue working in care homes as an HCSW”.
Professor Weir-Hughes continued: “As part of their approach, the researchers will review previous work into the regulation of HCSWs that has been carried out in each of the four countries of the UK, most recently by the Scottish Health Directorate. The Scottish work has been extremely helpful in defining good employment practice. We now need to look at a system of UK wide centralised regulation of HCSWs”.
Professor Peter Griffiths said: “We are delighted to be undertaking this research which will provide the NMC with an overview of the current key issues. Future developments in the nursing role open the possibility that more and more nursing work will be undertaken by non registered staff which can and do raise questions about how best to ensure the safety of patients and the public who receive care that is supervised but not delivered by registered nurses.”