pcw6924

Hi, I am a 2nd year student at Queens University. Was offered a place in Magee and also in Coleraine through the UCAS clearing system, then eventually Queens (who didn't use the UCAS at the time) offered me a place. Queens is close to my home so it was the obvious choice for me. How do you find nursing in Manchester? Its difficult to say what the job situation is like here for nursing - you hear different reports. Right now we are studying our Community Nursing module and I notice that Queens keep mentioning that many of us may find ourselves doing Community nursing because of the way the job market is at present. So from that you can assume that it is not great. I have another 3 weeks at uni, then out on placement for 6 weeks - I'm going to the City hospital, then we have a reading week, followed by exam week, then another 6 week placement (don't know where to yet) and that should take us up to Xmas and then I am on holidays. Queens have 2 intakes each year - Sept & Feb - I am in the Feb'08 intake so our main holidays all in Jan/Feb. 2nd year OSCEs are on in November. Fingers crossed.

I'm not sure whereabouts you are studying but certainly here in N.Ireland I know there are students who have done so. I think the NMC requirements are that your course is to be completed within 5 years. Don't be afraid to approach your Personal Tutor , after all it is part of their job to advise you and point you in the right direction for support. Your university also probably has a Student Guidance centre which may also be able to provide you with some support with your personal issues and confidentiality will be maintained. Good Luck!

I take it that you are speaking about a clinical placement - What a shame that you finish feeling cheated. I am studying nursing in Northern Ireland and I know there are probably many differences in the way that our nursing education is carried out compared to that in the USA. Here we spend a number of weeks in university then we spend the same length of time out in clinical placement (which may be in a hospital, nursing home, community etc). When we are assigned to a placement we are also assigned a mentor who will be a staff nurse working in the placement location but it is one student to one mentor. In addition to this, we also have a "link lecturer" who is a lecturer who will call in and visit you whilst you are on placement to make sure that you have settled, have no difficulties or concerns. Our rota will usually be the same as your mentor, you will not necessarily have every day the same but a large percentage of your rota will match your mentors. I tend to treat all staff as a mentor as I believe I will learn something from everyone. Although a few students have had mentors who they didn't get along with or were disappointed with, I have been extremely lucky in that in my 4 different placements last year, I could not fault any of my mentors - they were all brilliant. Most of staff were very willing to answer any of my questions and very willing to show me new things and let me practice. We have a portfolio to complete and sign off as you practice various procedures and I have been lucky to have had the opportunity to practice most of them. Obviously depending on the placement, there may be some procedures that are not relevant to that placement. I have founf patients brilliant, I think they are happy to feel that they are helping in your training, so far everyone has been more than willing to let me participate. Do you have link lecturers attached to your placements in the USA? If so, could it not be raised with them if the student feels that they are not getting the proper assistance and learning experiences? :nuke:

Hi there I have just joined up on allnurses.com. Just a quick note to say that I think you will love your course - I completed my Access course this year. I was studying it at night classes - two years part-time. It was a wonderful course - I live in Belfast so the course may have been of a slightly different format than those carried out in England. I studied 2 different modules of Chemistry, 2 of Biology,each of these modules was 1 year long, a single module of Statistics but this was 2 years long and then over the 2 years another module called Support Skills which consisted of IT Skills, Study Skills, Presentations, and Interview techniques. One word of advice , if you hit a stage where you think you can't do it all - don't give up, you'll manage to get through it and afterwards it does give a boost to your confidence. My confidence in relation to studying has definately increased. I am a mature student (very mature! I might add) so I was really surprised when I got offered a place to study nursing by four universities. Queens in Belfast have two intakes each year - Sept & Feb and I will be starting there next February (more mature students in the 2nd intake). So stick to it and enjoy!