How we develop our standards

We want to make sure that nurses, midwives and nursing associates are equipped with the knowledge skills and behaviours they need to deliver safe care now and in the future. That’s why we review our standards routinely.

When developing standards we work collaboratively with nursing and midwifery professionals, representatives from the wider health and social care community, advocacy groups and members of the public.

All these people have a valuable contribution to make and help us to develop standards that reflect best evidence which support our professionals in delivering safe and compassionate care.

Reviewing our standards

We began a major review of all our education standards and our quality assurance processes in 2016.

Since then, we have:

• introduced a new framework for education which includes a new approach for student supervision and assessment
• redefined our pre-registration standards of proficiency for both nursing and midwifery
• created new standards for prescribers
• introduced the new nursing associate role in England and welcomed the first nursing associates to our register
• launched new return to practice standards which help people remain on, and re-join, our register

We’re now moving on to reviewing our post-registration standards.

Recent updates to our standards 

Midwifery standards

November 2019

• Standards of proficiency for midwives - the knowledge and skills that midwives must have at the point of joining our register
• Standards for pre-registration midwifery programmes - requirements that apply to all pre-registration midwifery education programmes

Return to practice standards

March 2019

• Return to practice standards - the options available if you are unable to meet the practice hours requirements for revalidation or readmission
• Standards for return to practice programmes - requirements that apply to all approved return to practice programmes

Nursing associate standards

October 2018

• Standards of proficiency for nursing associates - the knowledge and skills that nursing associates should have at the point of joining our register 
• Standards for pre-registration nursing associate programmes - the requirements that apply to all pre-registration nursing associate education programmes

Standards for education and training

May 2018

• Standards framework for education and training - standards for providers of all pre- and post-registration  nursing, midwifery and nursing associate programmes
• Standards for student supervision and assessment - how nursing, midwifery and nursing associate students are supported and assessed in theory and practice

Nursing standards

May 2018

• Standards of proficiency for registered nurses - the knowledge and skills that nurses should have at the point of joining our register 
• Standards for pre-registration nursing programmes - the requirements that apply to all pre-registration nursing programmes

Prescribing standards

May 2018

• Standards for prescribing programmes - the requirements that apply to all prescribing programmes
• Adoption of the Royal Pharmaceutical Society’s competency framework – the knowledge and skills that nurse and midwife prescribers should have 
• We withdrew our standards for medicines management.