Nursing Standard

23/11/2025

What is it like to work at a top trust in the NHS league table?

NHS trusts in England are being ranked on key areas of performance, including cancer care and emergency departments delays.

Nurses from high and low-ranking trusts share their experience >

NHS league tables have been introduced in England, ranking acute, non-acute and ambulance trusts according to key areas including cancer care, waiting times for elective procedures and delays in emergency care, as well as financial performance. We look at what defines a high or low-performing trust,...

23/11/2025

Today is Nursing Support Workers' Day!

Nursing support workers play vital roles helping our nursing teams, patients. families, and carers every single day.

Click here for resources for the entire nursing family > https://rcni.com/nursing-standard

22/11/2025

Most early career nurses are often told to gain ward experience before specialising.

But is a generalist approach to your early career years always best?

Get advice from specialist nurses >

Traditional advice says newly registered nurses should gain broad ward experience before specialising, but many argue the right decision is as individual as the nurse. Specialising early can accelerate expertise and access to higher-band roles, but gaining wider experience can help nurses find the r...

21/11/2025

Employment tribunal claims: how many nurses win compensation?

Find out what the success rate of tribunals for claimants is, what nurses can make claims about, and how to begin the process.

This interactive article on employment tribunal claims explores data from freedom of information requests to NHS trusts and health boards. It details how much money may be awarded to claimants, what nurses can make claims about, describes a ‘landmark’ tribunal case involving discrimination, what...

21/11/2025

An NHS trust’s decision to restrict bank shifts as part of a cost-cutting exercise is one of the main topics discussed in the latest episode of the Nursing Standard podcast.

🎧 Listen here

The latest Nursing Standard podcast discusses an NHS trust’s decision to restrict bank shifts, news of a chief nurse being reinstated to her role following suspension, and free tea and coffee being scrapped for one trust’s staff among other hot topics

20/11/2025

What are the uniform rules at your trust?

Today, NHS uniform policies allow nurses more individual expression, but there are still rules.

Click here to find out more >

NHS uniform policies help identify nursing staff and give the public confidence, emphasise patient safety through hygiene and infection prevention, and also provide staff comfort. Today there is more scope for individual expression, but clear rules still apply. Here we look at examples of good and b...

20/11/2025

The NMC wants to launch a consultation on education standards including proposals to cut students’ practice and theory hours by 1,000 hours, with mandatory community placements and limits on simulated hours.

https://rcni.com/nursing-standard/newsroom/news/nursing-students-could-see-practice-learning-cut-500-hours-219106

19/11/2025

A nurse has been struck off by the NMC for covertly giving medication inside food that had been on the floor.

An NMC panel raised concerns about contamination and right to consent. The nurse was also accused of pushing and slapping the same patient.

https://rcni.com/nursing-standard/newsroom/news/nurse-struck-for-hiding-patients-medication-mashed-potato-218871

19/11/2025

Hundreds of NHS nurses have had their roles upgraded from band 5 to 6 after requesting that employers review their pay grades.

However, thousands more are still waiting for the same role evaluation, which was offered to band 5 nurses on Agenda for Change contracts in Scotland.

Thousands of band 5 nurses on Agenda for Change contracts have requested a rebanding review but are experiencing a time-consuming process. Scottish Government pledged that employers would consider applications for role upgrades in response to concerns that many were working beyond the scope of their...

18/11/2025

Secrets of a volunteer nurse: the events and places you can go

Find out how volunteering to use your nursing skills outside your workplace can open up opportunities and even boost your career prospects.

How volunteering to use your nursing skills at events or locations can open up unique experiences and opportunities, and even boost your career prospects. Gaining experience as a volunteer shows initiative and commitment, and can offer travel and learning opportunities, with a chance to develop addi...

17/11/2025

A care home resident with multiple health conditions including Parkinson’s disease died from sepsis after care home staff failed to recognise that a spinal wound had become infected until he became seriously unwell.

It was found staff were unclear how they were being asked to manage his wound in a care plan provided by the local acute hospital where he had been treated.

Resident was sent back to care home after being treated in hospital for a spinal wound. Care home staff failed to recognise wound had become infected and were unclear how they were being asked by the hospital to manage it, coroner says in prevention of future deaths report

17/11/2025

A few years ago, a district and community nursing survey found that only 1% of 492 nurses left work on time.

What is the situation in your workplace – and if you leave work late, what is the reason?