Initially an 18 month programme, Florence will recruit nurses new to primary care and place them within host practices in Hartlepool and Stockton. The programme will be responsible for their overall training to become valuable new members of the workforce. We were over the moon to receive 29 applications for the first cohort on the scheme!
Workforce development, and nurses specifically, was a strong theme coming from our recent Fit for the Future strategy events and we have been working on ways to support this crucial area.
Fiona Adamson, chief executive at Hartlepool and Stockton Health, was thrilled to have heard from so many practices interested in the scheme. She said “Florence will recruit nurses new to primary care, place them within host practices and be responsible for their overall training to become valuable new members of the workforce. We will be encouraging our new nurses to choose an area for specialist training in the last few months of the scheme, and our hope is that they can work with practices to decide what their local population most needs – perhaps COPD or diabetes expertise.”
“As well as encouraging nursing staff into primary care, the focus of the scheme is to take some of the pressure (and risk) away from practices. We understand just how much effort is needed to attract and train staff so we’ll take care of the recruitment and administration, and get nurses up to speed in terms of training.”
The CCG has been allocated some funding to use for Nursing Career Start and so we are hopeful that they will be able to give their support to the Federation scheme too.