The handbook for nursing associates and assistant practitioners / Gillian Rowe, Scott Ellis, Deborah Gee, Kevin Graham, Michelle Henderson, Janette Barnes, Chris Counihan, Jade Carter-Bennett.

"The nursing associate is a recently created role and still very much in its infancy. It was borne out of a desire to bridge the gap between the Registered Nurse and support workers like Healthcare Assistants to provide better options for career development and new work-based routes into the nursing profession. There are large numbers of existing staff and potential new recruits who aspire to become nurses but are unable to embark on a nursing degree for a variety of reasons. The Nursing Associate pathway now provides a new regulated and protected role that provides a new access point and potential stepping-stone towards entering the nursing profession in the future. The 1st edition of this book was originally conceived as a project aimed at FE learners studying on access to healthcare courses or undergoing training related to the assistant practitioner role. When the nursing associate role was announced however, we were able to quickly pivot the book and so that it could also serve the newly emerging Nursing Associate pilot courses. This approach has proven to be extremely successful; we were first to market and saw strong sales immediately. The book has comfortably beaten estimate and has reprinted twice in its first 12 months. The market for Nursing Associates is growing quickly and we are gaining more adoptions with each passing month. The government initially set out with a pilot of 2000 places across 35 institutions, rising to 5000 in 2018 and 7500 in 2019, all to be delivered under the apprenticeship model. Demand for places has been extremely strong with providers typically being oversubscribed with applicants. If the numbers stabilise at 7500 per year over the long term then the nursing associate market will become one of the largest healthcare cohorts in the UK larger than mental health nursing and on a par with medical students"-- Provided by publisher.