Clinical hours short of NMC suggestion?

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First of all, I really hope Silverdragon reads this and gives me insight.

I have sent out my application as well as all of my paperwork to the NMC for my nursing license, except my training form. I was trained in the US at an accredited University and received my bachelor degree, which consisted of three full years of nursing training and one year of prerequisites.

I have been working for two years as a theatre nurse.

I passed my IELTS with 9's acrossed the board.

I have had my licensure body fill out the paper and mailed it.

The two references are filled out and mailed.

In other words, I fulfill all the requirements of licensure in the UK thus far.

My concern is: when the dean of my university took my transcripts, she needed to convert the credit hours to actual hours. The clinical hours that she calculated up was in the six hundreds. The NMC suggests approximately two thousand hours for clinical time.

How can there be such a difference?

Will this affect my ability to be licensed in the uk?

I am frustrated that with all of the work and money I've spent on this, that it may not come to fruition. In addition, I am moving to the UK next April regardless of the decision of the NMC, as I will be going on a spousal visa. But I am also aware that there is no more clinical training hours that I could have possibly taken to add up to their suggestion.

Am I missing something?

Any insight would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Heather

Hi MuppetAus! Congrats! I hope you get your pin # soon from the NMC. I heard that it takes about 4-6 weeks? I was just curious, did you take the exam the third time your class met at Bournemouth? or did you guys meet up again on a different day to take the test?

Thanks :)

My PIN has arrived and I have had my first day of orientation. I will post about my experiences when I'm a little more settled.

The ONP - the third day is the exam day. You will also hand in your workbook. You will then come back later in the day to get your results and workbook back again, and a brief chat about the course.

Migranehead ache it is hard for me to give you an idea of the costs involved because our exchange rates are different. It roughly cost me $4500 but I haven't sat down and worked it out exactly. This didn't include costs once I was in the UK. Such as food, trains and other stuff. I would be super careful taking on a loan there are lots of bad agents out there and you don't know until it is to late.

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Yes, MuppetAus! Pls. do update us with your experiences. :) Wait, there is another fee we have to pay to get out PIN #? and how long did you have to wait for it? abt 4 wks?

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I was lucky I only had to wait 3 weeks for my PIN but some have had to wait longer. The hospital I work for is happy to check electronic that I'm registered and then bring in the PIN card for offical view but some hospitals will not let people start until the nurse has the PIN card in their hand.

I'm into my 5th week now. I'm working in the day chemo suite, so I'm not doing weekends and nights. They work a variety of 8hrs, 10hr and 12 hr shifts depending on the demand of the area. The 12 hr shifts aren't to bad. I find if I keep busy I feel better at the end of the day. It's when there is a quite moment that tiredness kicks in. If you work the 12hrs you get 1hr lunch break. Mostly because it is to difficult to have 2 30min breaks. I wear blue scrubs but the other nurses wear white shirts with blue piping around the collar and sleeve and blue scrub trousers. I wear scrubs because I'm agency (I don't know why).

I have had a few moments where I have been unsure that I have made the right move over here. It's little things like familiar routines and procedures. For example where I came from we would use normal saline to flush between each unit of blood and have really frequent obs, but here there is no flushing not even when the bag is finished. It's not wrong just different to what I'm used too.

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MuppetAus- how did you find it going being agency and new to the NHS?I am staff in the A&E- and although I am familiar with emergency care, I am glad I made the choice to start where I did- even terms are different to those in the US.You mentioned the uniforms. NHS staff nurses (?everywhere?) wear white tops with blue trim. Agencies wear similar colours/uniforms in my hospital.

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MuppetAus- how did you find it going being agency and new to the NHS?I am staff in the A&E- and although I am familiar with emergency care, I am glad I made the choice to start where I did- even terms are different to those in the US.You mentioned the uniforms. NHS staff nurses (?everywhere?) wear white tops with blue trim. Agencies wear similar colours/uniforms in my hospital.

NoleNurse I don't mind being agency. I like that I'm not commited to anywhere. I feel like I have some control over where I am and what I'm doing, and I don't feel I get caught up in the politics of wards/areas.

The NHS is pretty similar to the health system where I'm from. One big thing I have noticed is the lack of input and influence the unions have. In Australia you can't blink without unions being involved. Here lunch breaks get shortened and work hours extended and nothing ... no comment from the unions at all. I'm not a big fan of unions but I do think they have there place.

My uniform is royal blue scrubs. The permenant nursing staff where the white tops with blue trim.

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Specializes in NICU.

I've been told that because of the NMC code of conduct, nurses basically can't protest much. Like strikes are not allowed, for example (or risk losing your license). Additionally, you must report any wrongdoings (of course), but you also run the risk of being fired for doing so without much union repercussion. Our professor told of us of many stories while I was taking the ONP class...

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Specializes in Medical and general practice now LTC.

Yep, have to agree the unions are not much good in the UK and I always felt we as nurses got the worst deal from the government cos they knew most wouldn't strike or couldn't strike

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Specializes in Advanced Practice, surgery.
I've been told that because of the NMC code of conduct, nurses basically can't protest much. Like strikes are not allowed, for example (or risk losing your license). Additionally, you must report any wrongdoings (of course), but you also run the risk of being fired for doing so without much union repercussion. Our professor told of us of many stories while I was taking the ONP class...

I'd have to disagree with the statement about being fired, it is extremely difficult to get dismissed in the NHS because of the HR policies that protect staff. I've worked over 25 years in the health service and have only known 3 nurses fired, and they were for misconduct.

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Specializes in NICU.

Okay, to be fair I have no experience of nursing in the UK. This is just what the professor at the UK university told our class about the punitive measures. There was a couple from Australia who were also lawyers who said it didn't seem legal/equitable, but the professor said that was kind of the way things were. Maybe it was different when this professor was actually at the bedside? I didn't know if she currently practiced or was just teaching at the school.

One of the biggest cases was a nurse who gave an overdose of antibiotics to a kid (who then died) and was fired, although the doctor who prescribed it didn't have anything happen to him.

She also told us of a story who spoke out against a surgeon who was doing ethically wrong things and the hospital fired her for reporting him.

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Specializes in Advanced Practice, surgery.

My experience is completely different.

Medicine errors will get you challenged but rarely dismissed unless its a number of consecutive errors, or a catastrophic error.

Highlighting poor practice again unlikely to get you dismissed and in fact actively encouraged.

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Hi there,

I've read through this forum and tried to find the answer to my questions elsewhere, so apologies if I've missed the mark but this does seem like the best place to voice my concerns, and I'd really appreciate any help. Coffee Nurse, babyRN, and Silverdragon in particular, if you read this I would appreciate your advice.

I'm 28 and JUST starting my nursing prerequisites; I will be a second-degree student, as I already have a BA in English. I was already leaning towards getting my BSN and working for awhile before ultimately acquiring my NP degree, but then I discovered that travel nursing existed, and I nearly imploded from excitement. But now I am doing quite a bit of research that's making it seem like working for a travel company like Continental Travel Nurse in the UK would be difficult, if not outright impossible. I want to make clear that (at least at this moment) I am NOT interested in immigrating to the UK; I merely wish to work there as a travel nurse for a period of time, likely through CTN, if possible.

I am in particular concerned about the strict hour requirements---I read through this thread and elsewhere, and have been told verbally by a lady with Continental Travel Nurse that the NMC accepts nurses with BSN's from the US, most of which do not have the same clinical hours in their training as EU training does, but now I am seeing that accelerated BSN's are not accepted? This seems bizarre, as the accelerated BSN program I was looking at actually has MORE clinical hours required of their students than the traditional BSN, clocking in at 728 clinical hours in one 12-month cycle. I am now more confused than ever about what to do if I hope to one day work as a travel nurse in the UK and still fulfill my dream of working in the healthcare field.

My options are these:

-Take 3 years (1 year prereqs, 2 years program) to get my RN, then work as an RN while I take online courses through the public university/hospital system here to acquire my BSN. Total time: 5ish years.

-Take 4 years (2 years of prereqs/wait cycle to apply, 2 years actually enrolled at 4-year institution) to get my BSN in the "traditional" method. Would require one additional year of working as an RN before I could apply. Total: 5 years.

-Take 2.5 years (1.5 years of prereqs, 1 12-month intensive cycle) to get my BSN through an accelerated program. Work as an RN for 1-1.5 years before I apply to work. Total time: 3.5-4 years. The prereqs are actually MORE rigorous to get into this program than a regular BSN. The school that offers this is highly respected and considered "the nursing school" in this state (described thus by an advisor I spoke to at another institution).

Could anyone point me in the right direction, or at least tell me where else I might look that would clarify this? I am sorry for such a lengthy post but I just want to make sure I get set on the right course now, and don't wind up closing a door before I even realize what I've done.

thanks very much for reading all that! xo

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Specializes in NICU.

I would call up the NMC and ask to speak to a decision officer (first line phone people are not much help as they are reading off a piece of paper)...from what others have posted, no, you can't do an accelerated degree. Why? Who knows? After all, we have to take the IELTS even though we grew up speaking the English language. Every country has its own idiosyncrasies...it's already a stretch for the NMC to allow US nurses to get a license because we all have less than half of the clinical hours that the UK nurses have (the difference being that they generally don't need much orientation, according to my professor at my overseas nursing class whereas US new grads usually get at least 8-12 weeks).

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