Associate Practitioners in Health and Social Care
Why Associate Practitioners?
It has been widely reported that NHS organisations and other employers in the health and social care sector will face future shortages of staff, particularly professional staff, over the next 5 - 10 years and beyond. These shortages will be caused by a combination of ageing workforce, expansion of health services leading to increased demand for labour, a general reduction in the UK labour pool and increased competition from other sectors for the shrinking labour pool.
It is proposed that these shortages, particularly of professional staff, could be met in part by the introduction of Associate Practitioners.
What is an Associate Practitioner?
The new NHS Career Framework has 9 levels. This new role fits between that of a senior support worker (level 3) and a qualified professional (level 5), at level 4 within the new NHS Career Framework.
An Associate Practitioner role provides a new career opportunity for support workers and senior healthcare assistants.
'A worker that delivers care to patients under the direct supervision of a registered practitioner, with a level of knowledge and skill beyond that of the traditional healthcare support worker, taking some tasks from registered professionals and may work across many of the traditional professional boundaries'.
It is anticipated that associate practitioners will become a highly respected and valuable additional resource in the skill mix strategies employed within the NHS to deliver high quality patient care. They will play a key role in freeing professionals to extend their role while relieving capacity pressures.
Developing education and training for Associate Practitioners in West Yorkshire
The WYLLN Health Social Care and Early Years Sector Group are consulting on a West Yorkshire wide approach to learning and professional development to help employers in health and social care access appropriate learning for staff so they can meet the skills levels required for Associate Practitioner roles.
Besides the development of full programmes such as Foundation Degrees for new staff with appropriate entry level skills and qualifications, the aim is to develop a framework which will allow employers, working with HE providers, to tailor-make pathways from a suite of accredited units as new AP roles emerge. This will allow existing staff to undertake training according to the needs of each individual and the AP role they are stepping into without undertaking a full course unnecessarily - for example, some staff may already be highly skilled in most areas but have just a few specific development needs to perform at Associate Practitioner level. As well as gathering credit for the learning they undertake as part of the programme, learners would have the option of gaining accreditation for their previous experience so it could count towards a full award.
The framework could also include the opportunity for employers to gain accreditation for training they deliver themselves. The result should be a streamlined approach to curriculum development which will allow education providers to respond quickly as new roles and competency frameworks emerge, with flexible pathways and modes of learning to support workforce transformation.
All four validating universities in West Yorkshire have been invited to participate in this development, with the intention that programmes can be accessed via a wide range of HE providers including Further Education colleges with much of the learning being done in the workplace. An event in September at the University of Bradford involving both education and service providers in health care and social care will determine which roles to prioritise, with areas such as mental health, learning disability and rehabilitation support being potential candidates.
Ultimately, with the integration of service delivery in health, social care and early years, the framework has the potential to stretch across a wide variety of roles and levels providing opportunities for staff to develop practice in other areas and across professional boundaries.
Alison Hedley
WYLLN Sector Officer (Health, Social Care and Early Years),
Escalate Team, University of Bradford,
Email: a.hedley@bradford.ac.uk
