9th September 2024
The Institute of Health Visiting (iHV) is delighted to publish the new iHV UK Preceptorship Framework for Health Visiting.
Developed to recognise the higher levels of autonomy and specialist knowledge and skills that health visitors require, beyond their first level registration as registered nurses and registered midwives, this much-needed resource will support best practice for preceptorship programmes for health visitors across the UK.
Newly qualified health visitors represent the future of the profession and are highly valued. It is vital that they are welcomed into the workplace with the right individualised support to enable them to grow and flourish. The provision of high-quality preceptorship for health visitors prepares and enables their leadership development and ongoing practice-based learning – this supports the essential delivery of safe and effective care which contributes to reducing inequalities and improving outcomes for babies, children, families and communities.
Currently, many health visiting services across the UK are experiencing significant shortages and attrition in the health visiting workforce. With challenges to recruitment and retention, health visiting services are looking for ways to reduce the disruption and financial costs of a high staff turnover. The provision of high-quality preceptorship for health visitors is key to attracting and sustaining a highly skilled health visiting workforce.
The iHV UK Preceptorship Framework will complement other relevant country-specific legislation, statutory requirements, organisational policies and procedures for preceptorship for health visiting and keep best practice in mind. We recommend all organisations employing health visitors implement this new Preceptorship Framework for Health Visiting.
Amanda Holland – Professional Services Lead, Institute of Health Visiting and Author of the iHV Preceptorship Framework for Health Visiting, commented:
“In the current climate, with many organisations experiencing significant challenges to recruitment and retention of a highly skilled health visiting workforce, we know high-quality effective preceptorship can be an important part of the solution. Supporting and enabling newly qualified health visitors to lay strong foundations from the beginning of their career is vital to enable them to grow and thrive and achieve their professional aspiration throughout the preceptorship period and beyond. Enabling a good learning environment, where the preceptee is at the centre of preceptorship, and wellbeing and psychological safety is prioritised is key to success.
“It has been a privilege to lead this project to co-develop an iHV UK Preceptorship Framework for Health Visitors and work with a vast group of passionate and dedicated experts and stakeholders from across the UK.”
Marian Judd – Health Visitor and Practice Lead, HCRG Care Group, B&NES and Wiltshire Children’s Community Services, England and Co-Chair of the iHV Practice Education Network, said:
“The new iHV UK Preceptorship Framework for Health Visiting is the fruit of a UK-wide collaboration that has been inspiring and motivating. Its aim and hope is to offer organisations, which employ health visitors from all four nations, a Framework that is preceptee-led, relevant and adaptable to enable new health visitors to embed the NMC Code and NMC 2022 Standards of proficiency for specialist community public health nurse health visitors, evolve into confident practitioners, and thrive to make a difference for babies, children and families.
“This was a wonderful opportunity to co-author this Preceptorship Framework for Health Visiting which stemmed from my contribution to the iHV Practice Education Network (PEN) as co-chair. This partnership with iHV continues to inspire and develop my passion for health visitor education alongside my lead role in B&NES and Wiltshire. Leading practice education has been a consistent theme throughout my health visiting career, from one-to-one student support to developing effective learning environments working collaboratively with the Higher Education Institutions in the South and South West of England, local teams and the iHV.”
The iHV UK Preceptorship Framework for Health Visiting provides:
- A Preceptorship Framework to support best practice for preceptorship programmes for health visitors
- A valuable overview of the research, evidence and policy on preceptorship
- Practical guidance including:
- the key ingredients of an effective preceptorship programme
- the iHV Preceptorship Gradient of Growing, Embedding and Thriving (GET)
- the iHV Hierarchy of Learning Needs
- examples of outputs and outcomes of a preceptorship programme
- A Framework for implementation and quality assurance in practice
Alison Morton – CEO, Institute of Health Visiting, added:
“I fully support the aims of this much-needed iHV UK Preceptorship Framework for Health Visiting to facilitate a consistent, personalised approach to preceptorship for every health visitor. The iHV seeks to achieve consensus with organisations employing health visitors actively supporting the Preceptorship Framework and ‘signing up’ to use the Framework in developing locally-agreed programmes, as part of their organisation’s quality strategy.”
The iHV UK Preceptorship Framework for Health Visitors has been developed through an extensive collaborative process with a wide range of experts and stakeholders from all four nations of the UK – iHV extends huge thanks to them for their expertise, guidance and support during this process.
Please use this link to cite the iHV UK Preceptorship Framework for Health Visiting – https://bit.ly/3ATKD7x
