London university to launch new post-doctoral pilot for nurses
A London university is set to pilot a new post-doctoral bridging scheme that aims to support nurses, midwives and allied health professionals to develop their clinical academic careers after completing a PhD.
Those behind the scheme told Nursing Times they hoped it would bring benefits to individual career pathways, patient outcomes and to the NHS as a whole.
“Having this scheme brings benefits to patient outcomes, patient experiences, individual career trajectories, but also to the NHS”
Suzanne Bench
London South Bank University (LSBU) has been awarded funding from national body Health Education England to trial the new programme, starting in February 2021.
It is designed to give senior NHS health professionals the “space and support” to develop a “robust application” for a National Institute of Health Research (NIHR) post-doctoral award and to develop further as clinical academics.
The scheme is made up of taught content, such as master classes and debates, and individuals will be given a mentor at both the university and their employer to support them.
Successful candidates will also support junior researchers studying for a PhD and will be actively involved in research work at the university.
It is anticipated that individuals will have three or four hours a month of direct content from the university as part of the scheme.
To be eligible for the scheme, staff must be in a role where at least 50% of their time is spent in clinical practice and their employers would need to agree to release them to have time for the programme.
Suzanne Bench
Under the initiative, HEE is providing £5,000 to trusts for each successful candidate to support their training requirements.
Professor of critical care nursing at LSBU, Suzanne Bench, said the programme would offer staff with “new opportunities to combine their clinical careers with high-level research”.
She told Nursing Times that “one of the big gaps at the moment is having jobs for these people to go to”, as many trusts lacked a career framework for post-doctoral clinical academics.
It is, therefore, hoped that the pilot will help to prevent clinicians with this skill set from leaving the NHS to take up academic careers, for example. “It will help people to push forward a career,” Professor Bench told Nursing Times.
“I feel like there has been a lot of frustration over the past years about getting stuck in the path and really wanting to move forward, and not feeling that anybody is listening or knowing how to move forward.
“So, this is a real step in the right direction to help them feel valued as well,” Professor Bench told Nursing Times.
The collaborative model between the university and trusts would “help the NHS to understand what these candidates need” and would also help the university to understand what the NHS needs from the individuals, she added.
For those on the scheme, one of the main benefits was that they would become a “competitive applicant” for the NIHR award.
“This is a real step in the right direction to help them feel valued as well”
Suzanne Bench
This was a “massive benefit”, said Professor Bench who flagged that, for nurses and allied health professionals generally, the number of applications is “fewer and they are less successful”.
Meanwhile, for the NHS trusts involved in the pilot, it would help them to “understand what having a clinical academic in their organisation can bring and for the individual”, said Professor Bench.
“Having the organisation understand means that they are more likely to develop career structures within the organisation that support individual growth in the future,” she added.
It would also “help to develop collaborative relationships between academic institutions and practice”, noted Professor Bench.
On the whole, she said having senior staff that were engaged in clinical practice and research “on the shop floor” of a trust “improves patient outcomes and patient experiences”.
“Having this scheme that increases the number of senior clinical academics in the NHS brings benefits to patient outcomes, patient experiences, individual career trajectories, but also to the NHS more broadly and will also help more competitive funding applications more widely as well, which is also a challenge,” she said.
The team at LSBU were “absolutely thrilled to have been awarded this pilot”, which aims to support around seven individuals within the HEE London region from February to November next.
The closing date for applications is 4 January and interviews will take place the following week.
source: nursingtimes
