Professional Nurse Advocate Certificate of Credit

Nursing is one of the most trusted and transformational professions, and 2020 showed us that the World needs nurses to lead and advocate. 2020 also highlighted that many health and social care workers are experiencing stress, mental health issues, and burnout. Modern health and social care practice is a challenging place to work, and the COVID-19 pandemic has made this even more challenging. Stress and burnout will almost certainly increase due to the exceptional pressure that many nurses are experiencing during the pandemic (Kinman et al 2020; NHS Confederation 2020; West et al 2020).

This course prepares you to become a Professional Nurse Advocate, a role poised to support and lead the nursing workforce.

The role of a Professional Nurse Advocate (PNA) and use of A-EQUIP model (advocating for education and quality improvement) is part of the solution to supporting many of these issues.

The A-EQUIP model and the professional nurse advocate role aims to:

• Provide a supportive function
• Support professional resilience
• Support nurses to provide high quality care and identify areas for improvement
• Support the advocacy role of nurses
• Include strategies which develop and invest in nurses
• Allow flexibility for local implementation
• Not to create additional financial pressures on providers

During this 10-week course, you'll gain the skills and knowledge to facilitate restorative supervision for colleagues and teams within nursing services and beyond. You will be able to lead and deliver quality improvement initiatives in response to service demands and changing patient requirements.

Learning outcomes

On successful completion of this course, you should be able to:

• Apply and implement the skills and knowledge to become a Professional Nursing Advocate
• Critically evaluate advocacy skills, supervision, and restorative supervision
• Synthesise and implement change, quality enhancements, and continuous improvements
• Critically evaluate leadership theories and practices as applied to your own role and area of practice

Course content

This course will cover:

1. The role of the supervisor/Professional Nurse Advocate within the context of national and local governance policies
2. The role supervision plays in supporting nurses to consider their practice in relation to the Code and the requirements for revalidation
3. The educational principles which facilitate effective supervision
4. Supervision frameworks and models which can be used for understanding and managing the supervisory relationship
5. Skills which underpin the setting up and development of a successful supervisory relationship, including setting ground rules, negotiating, and working in partnership
6. A range of supervisory approaches and methods including facilitation, coaching, motivational interviewing, reflection, debriefing and managing challenging conversations
7. Approaches to evidence-based practice and quality improvement to ensure people experience safe, compassionate, person-centred care including the concept of advocacy. Flows of compassion and self-compassion
8. Ethical issues in clinical supervision which may affect the supervisory process for example, conflict of interest and maintaining professional boundaries
9. Techniques and processes to evaluate the clinical supervision process, including eliciting and utilising feedback
10. The need for on-going development of supervisory skills and for further reflection and updating of knowledge

Who this course is for

This module is aimed at NMC-registered nurses and nursing associates in any field of practice who would like to develop into Professional Nurse Advocates.

Course team

Programme Leader - Kendal Foster

Kendal has a BSc in Psychology and an MSc in mental health nursing, and is a registered mental health nurse. Kendal has also undertaken a postgraduate qualification in cognitive behavioural therapy. Kendal has worked in acute mental health services, community mental health and psychological therapy services since qualifying as a mental health nurse. Kendal's recently published research was exploring attitudes towards nurses and nursing in the 21st century.

Programme Leader - Rebecca Mosley

Rebecca is a Registered Adult Nurse and Registered Specialist Practitioner - District Nursing. Her qualifications include a BSc (Hons), AdvDip, PgDip (SPQDN), Pg Cert (IPPE), FHEA NMC Teacher. She has worked at the University of Derby since 2019 following a career in clinical practice. Her current teaching interests include the Nursing Associate programme and the Professional Nurse Advocate Programme.

How you will learn

This module is delivered online and so you will undertake self-paced study via our virtual learning environment. This means that predominantly you will study the online learning material rather than attend a series of scheduled lectures. This provides the flexibility to manage your studies around your existing work and home commitments.

You will engage with your tutors and fellow students via online discussion boards and there will be scheduled webinars at regular intervals throughout the module. Webinars will be recorded so that, if you are not able to attend, you will be able to catch up later.

This module takes place over 10 weeks and you will complete academic assignments as part of your work, and these contribute to the assessment. Overall, including work, study, and learning at your own pace, you'll spend about 20 hours per week on the course.

Find out more about studying online.

This course is fully funded by NHS England. To request a funded place on the course please contact england.nursingpna@nhs.net who will provide approval for you to apply to study this course.

To undertake this course, you must:

• Be an NMC-registered nurse or nursing associate in any field of practice
• Demonstrate previous learning / study at degree level (level 6) or international equivalent.
• Be nominated by your employer or a national body such as Health Education England/NHS England/NHS Improvement or similar for the programme (this will normally be confirmed directly with your employer or NHS England)

You must discuss your participation with senior nurses in your organisation. Candidates are normally identified by NHS England. Once chosen, you will be asked to apply to the University of Derby via the online application portal.

Please be aware that once NHS England have advised that you are eligible for a place on the course, you will be asked to apply to the University of Derby via the online application portal.

You will need to meet the entry criteria for the programme, as detailed above, in order for your application to be successful.

Documents to support your application

You'll need to provide:

• Photo ID – this could be your passport or driving licence
• NMC PIN number and/or statement of entry
• A certificate or transcript which confirms that you have undertaken study at degree level (this could be a prior degree or module at level 6)

Students should apply directly to the University.

Apply now

For support with completing your application, view our guide to the application process.

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