Launch of student guidance and first ever combined student nurse and midwife conference

Looking back on our first ever conference for students of both nursing and midwifery, and the launch of our new guidance for students.

1 October 2009 will be a memorable date for the NMC as it saw both the launch of our new student guidance and our first conference for nursing and midwifery students.

Student nurses and midwives with their copies of the new guidance

Both events allowed us to meet face to face with the future of the nursing and midwifery professions. The event was attended by students from across the UK and was supported by external speakers from higher education institutions and clinical practice.

Professor Tony Hazell, Chair of the NMC Council welcomed the delegates to Liverpool and the excellent BT Convention Centre on the Mersey waterfront. The students heard from and met members of Council and NMC staff from across the organisation.

Keynote sessions

Actors taking part in a role-playing session

All the presentations from the event are available to download.
2009 Student nurses and midwives conference and launch, Liverpool

View the gallery of images  [PDF]

Balancing personal and professional lives
Michael Yale, from Oval Consulting and Carmel Lloyd, who lead the development of the guidance, provided the opening session. A brief overview was followed by an interactive session with role play provided by two actors, Tanya Grier and Katie Foster. Mike involved the delegates in exploring some of the challenges students face including

• balancing their personal and professional lives
• maintaining confidentiality
• respecting the people they care for and those they work with
• team working
• maintaining appropriate sexual boundaries

Tony Hazell gives the opening speech at the 2009 conference

Dignity, respect and compassion
Amanda Waring, who also helped launch the Care of Older People guidance, reminded delegates of the importance of treating the people they care for with dignity, respect and compassion, providing a moving illustration in her video ‘What do you see?’

Fitness to practise
The delegates also found out about the Fitness to Practice processes both within the NMC and universities from Clare Stringfellow from the NMC Fitness to Practise Directorate and from Nicola Leather, from the Faculty of Health & Social Science, John Moores University in Liverpool.

Maintaining practice
Helen Ross, Senior Lecturer in Nursing and Linda Jackson, Lecturer, Sheffield Hallam University provided information for the delegates on the NMC requirement for registered nurses and midwives to maintain their practice.

Raising concerns
Nerys Bellefontaine, Practice Development Nurse, Outer North East London Community Services, gave an overview of her small scale research project exploring the difficulties students face in raising concerns and what support mechanisms may be available to them.

Questions and answers
The day was rounded off with an ‘Ask the NMC’ session. Delegates texted questions during the course of the day and these formed the basis of the session.

There was a lively discussion around several issues including

• the role and regulation of healthcare support workers
• support for preceptorship on commencing employment
• skills development within pre-registration programmes
• post-registration education opportunities including support for research in clinical practice
• the interpretation of ‘student’ as a prefix to nurse and midwife

This was a thought proving and stimulating day and one we hope will happen on an annual basis.

Student nurses and midwives reading the new guidance