Trainee Nursing Associate Review

Caring for patients. Patient care including personal care and medication. Admitting and discharging patients, referrals.

Developed my evaluating skills and learning about the effects of different medications.

I enjoy it, but the NHS at ward level needs a better understanding of the role of the nursing associate. Currently it feels like I’m primarily doing the work of an HCA and then doing the learning part of the Nursing Associate when there is time

I don’t feel it is well structured and is very stressful for the Trainee Nursing Associate. There is not enough communication between the trust and university. Also I do not feel we are supported well enough by the manager of the Trainees.

Not a lot. At ward level they have just started to understand what I should be doing, but I still feel very limited as I need to fulfill the health care assistant role too which is difficult. I do not find the overall manager of the Trainees supportive. Whenever there is an issue he hasn’t helped and this makes things difficult and stressful for me. On top of this, I think we should have supernumerary days to ensure we get all the learning requirements that we need. On a very busy ward this just isn’t possible.

This varies. Many over our lecturers have come and gone. There has been an extremely high turnover of staff. I feel that the lecturers and not well prepared and I don’t believe they actually know what they are trying to get up to achieve, particularly on the written modules. This is very difficult and confusing for us as learners. On top of this, there always seem to be problems in allocating suitable rooms. It feels like we are the least important students in the university.

I don’t. A lot of the stuff we have been taught I feel is unnecessary or irrelevant to what we are trying to achieve. Whereas things that I feel we should be focussing on more, such as Anatomy and Physiology, are skimmed over and not taught in enough detail.

Occasional social activities but these are only organised by the staff on the ward. Things such as leaving dos, Christmas and baby showers are organised by staff. I do not believe the trust as a whole provides us with any social or sporting activities, and there are no events to go to.

Yes

I enjoy my job and most of the staff are nice. I enjoy caring for people. I do sometimes feel appreciated by the staff and patients. However there are times when I feel the staff needs are not cared for. It is a very full on job and you never feel bored. I usually get a good sense of job satisfaction.

Be prepared to work hard and work as part of a team. Thee are long hours so be prepared to spend a lot of time on your feet. It is a very mentally and physically challenging, but the sense of job satisfaction more than makes up for that. Look after your own health and although you get a lot of days off, don’t do too many bank duties and this will drain you and ultimately ends up affecting patient care and you cannot work at your best as you will be drained and tired.