The Scottish Government has been working towards the development of a national approach to advanced practice, a key strand of the Transforming Nursing Roles programme. In addition, The Scottish Government’s Programme for Government includes the commitment to train 500 additional Advanced Nurse Practitioners (ANPs) by 2021. ANPs will be a crucial part of the Scottish Government’s aim to transform Primary Care and shift the balance of care from acute settings to the community. It is envisaged that many of these posts will be developed in community settings, including within the care sector.
National Approach to Advanced Practice
To reduce unwarranted variation in practice, a national approach to the ANP role has been agreed by the Transforming Nursing Roles Group and Scottish Executive Nurse Directors as outlined in the paper Transforming Nursing Roles: Developing Advanced Practice in NHS Scotland. NHS Boards are being asked to implement the recommendations within this report which apply to them. A key recommendation is that Boards undertake Service Needs Analyses (SNA) to help inform sustainable development of ANPs to meet the needs of patients.Â
Members of the independent care sector are being asked to participate in this SNA in order to ultimately have access to Scottish Government funding to train ANPs. A sum of £500,000 has been set aside for 2017/18 for this purpose. Care homes will be able to access the funding for additional training if there is an identified need, so if you perceive this would be helpful to your organisation, please complete the following needs assessment form by July 31:Â
https://response.questback.com/nhseducationforscotland/educationneedsanalysis2017
Any requests for an extension to this deadline, should be made to [email protected]Â
