How to Become a Nurse

Nursing is often referred to as the ‘caring profession’ because it is best suited to those who want to care for others and help them to feel better when they’re often at their most vulnerable. But nurses are highly qualified medical professionals who do so much more than simply care for their patients. Nurses also help to monitor their patients’ medical needs, assisting with their treatment, and often helping to make decisions about the best treatment plan to pursue. Nursing is a challenging role, but also an incredibly rewarding one.

Think you might have what it takes to become a nurse but want to find out more? From what nursing jobs really involve to what nursing salary you can expect to earn, here’s everything you need to know about how to become a nurse:

What is a Nurse?

A nurse is a medical professional who is often one of the first professionals that many patients will interact with. As a frontline, face-to-face nurse, you will help your patient to feel at ease, gather their medical details and advocate for them when they are feeling vulnerable. Nursing is an incredibly diverse role, and no two days will ever be exactly the same.

Nursing has five main specialisms: Adult nursing, children and young people nursing, learning disabilities nursing, mental health nursing and midwifery. You can either take a generic nursing qualification and then choose which area of nursing you would like to specialise in at a later stage, or you can take specific qualifications to enable you to pursue a career in your preferred type of nursing directly.

Individuals with a nursing degree are considered amongst the most employable in the UK: 94% of nursing graduates have secured a job within the first six months of finishing their course. This makes nursing a great career choice if you’re looking for long term job security.

Personal Qualities of a Nurse

Wondering if you’ve got what it takes to become a nurse? To succeed in this career, the following personal qualities are highly desirable:

• You must be caring and empathetic, with an ability to really focus on others and put their needs first
• You must have excellent communication skills, as nursing is a people-facing role where you will be communicating with others all day
• You must have good attention to detail. From reading reports to noticing changes in your patient’s demeanour or responsiveness, attention to detail is a vital trait in a nurse
• You will need excellent problem-solving skills. The human body is often a puzzle, and often problem-solving skills, and the process of elimination, is needed to ascertain a patient’s condition
• Stamina and a good level of physical fitness. Nursing is a physically demanding role, and shift patterns mean nurses often work long hours
• A good sense of humour. In such a physically and mentally exhausting career, the ability to find the joy in things and taking time out to laugh can be vital
• Willingness to learn. Nurses are constantly learning because medicine is constantly advancing. If you’re not excited to learn more about the human body and apply this learning to helping your patients, then nursing might not be the career for you
• Good time management skills, so that you can treat all of your patients with the care they need, but in a relatively short time frame
• Strong leadership skills, enabling you to take control of emergency situations and lead a team of other healthcare professionals in providing the best care for your patients

What a Nurse Does

The primary role of a nurse is to care for individuals who are unwell and support them on their route back to health. There are many different ways that you can fulfil this role including by:

• Recording the medical history and symptoms of each of your patients, ensuring that you maintain extensive notes that can be shared with other medical professionals, making sharing notes as easy as possible
• Work as part of a multidisciplinary team to plan patient care, collaborating with other medical and social care professionals
• Listen to your patients and support them, advocating for both their wishes and their health and wellbeing
• Monitor your patient’s health, updating their records and charts, and recording any new signs and symptoms that they display as you are observing them
• Administer medications and treatments following a care plan that has been implemented by a doctor or other primary care physician
• Perform diagnostic tests including taking blood for blood tests
• Educating patients about healthy living and giving them the tools they need to manage their own illnesses
• Providing support and advice to patients whenever it is needed

How Much Does a Nurse Earn?

Whilst some nurses work within the private sector, a huge majority of nurses in the UK work for the NHS. If you work within the NHS then you will be paid according to the NHS Agenda for Change pay bands. As a newly qualified registered nurse you will enter the NHS pay scale at Band 5, with a starting salary of £25,655. With two to four years of experience, this figure will rise to £27,780 and a registered nurse with more than five years of experience can earn up to £31,534.

Depending on what kind of specialism you choose, your earning potential could also grow. School nurses, for example, are considered to be at Band 6 on the pay scale with a starting salary of £32,306 and a higher-end salary for more experienced professionals of £39,027. The more experience you gain, and the more additional training you undertake, the higher up the pay scale you can go. At the highest level, as a chief nurse (in Band 8d) you can expect to earn between £78,192 and £90,387.

If you work within a London hospital or clinical environment then you will also be eligible for London weighting: this is up to 20% of your salary if you work in an inner London setting and up to 15% of your salary if you work in an outer London setting.

Qualifications Needed for a Nurse

In order to work as a fully qualified nurse, you will need to secure a nursing degree, but there are several different routes that you can take to secure this degree, even if you don’t have the A-levels you need for the traditional entry route.

For the traditional route of entry to a nursing degree, you would need to demonstrate that you have secured at least two but usually three A-levels. Most universities will also require that you have at least two supporting GCSEs at grade C or above, and two of these will need to be in English and maths, to prove you have the numeracy and literacy skills needed to be a nurse. Some universities will also request that you have a supporting science GCSE in a subject such as biology or human biology. There are over 80 different universities offering undergraduate nursing courses within the UK, so it is important that you check the specific entry requirements for the university and for the course that you wish to apply to.

If you don’t have any A-levels, then that doesn’t have to stop you from pursuing your dream of becoming a nurse. You can also apply using UCAS points from equivalent qualifications. The UCAS points needed for a Nursing degree range from 96 points to 144 points, depending on the university you choose. These points can be gained from other relevant qualifications such as:

• CACHE Level 3 award in health and social care
• CACHE level 2 common health conditions
• CACHE level 2 certificate infection control in health care settings
• Health and social care level 3

Alternatively, you could study for a Level 3 Diploma in Nursing UK, and this is considered to be sufficient for entry to most nursing degrees as a stand-alone qualification. Entering university via this route has many benefits: you will already have relevant qualifications and skills in the nursing sector, and you will have demonstrated your commitment to pursuing a career in nursing.

If you have decided that you would like to become a nurse later in your academic career and already have an undergraduate degree that isn’t in nursing then that doesn’t mean that it’s too late to become a nurse. If you already have a degree in a relevant subject, you can often get recognition for this (a process called Accreditation of Prior Experiential Learning – APEL), enabling you to do a postgraduate course in two rather than three years, helping you to change your career path and become a registered nurse much sooner. Whichever route you choose, you will make your application to begin your nursing degree via UCAS.

Because nursing is such an in-demand sector in the UK right now, with a large number of jobs available, eligible undergraduate and postgraduate student nurses are now entitled to a grant of at least £5,000 to help them fund their studies. This is not a student loan, rather it is a grant or bursary that you will not have to repay when you have completed your course.

On the Job Training

When you take your nursing degree you need to know that this is a course with significant hands-on elements: you will be learning by watching and interacting with patients, rather than by studying in a formal environment with your nose in a book. But if you would prefer an entry route with minimal formal education then you could also consider a nursing apprenticeship. A unique form of on-the-job training, when you undertake a registered nurse degree apprenticeship (RNDA) you won’t need to be at university full time and can learn on the job in a flexible way that will fit in around your lifestyle. To work in this way, you will need to apply for an RNDA in the same way as you would apply for a job. Your employee will then release you from your work commitments to study at university part-time. Becoming a registered nurse in this way takes longer, with most courses taking four years. But the benefit of this kind of training is that you are learning on the job and that you will be earning whilst you are learning. As an apprentice, you will be eligible for a salary during your training period, although this will be less than you would earn once you are fully qualified.

In order to secure an RNDA you will need level 3 qualifications in both maths and English. You can also secure an RNDA if you are more qualified, but this might be given a slightly different title. If you have a level 5 qualification as an assistant practitioner or nursing associate, for example, you could gain a conversion or ‘top up RNDA’ apprenticeship.

If you are already working as a nursing associate, then you could also undertake on the job training to become a fully qualified registered nurse. Nursing associates often work alongside both nursing care support workers and registered nurses. Nursing associates can either be long term or trainee roles, and the position was created to open up the world of nursing to individuals from a wider spectrum of backgrounds. Because nursing associates work in a variety of settings, such as acute, social, community and primary care, they have more flexibility in their role. As a nursing associate you are not a registered nurse, but you are gaining the skills you need to fulfil a nursing role if you choose to undertake additional training and make that next step.

Finally, as a registered nurse it is important that you continue undertaking regular training, working on the basis that your learning process is never complete. New medical innovations can revolutionise treatments for certain conditions, and as a registered nurse it is important that you understand these innovations and how you can apply them. For this reason, continued professional development (CPD) is essential within the nursing community. In fact, to maintain your membership of the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) you must have undertaken 35 hours of continuing professional development (CPD) relevant to your scope of practice in the three-year period since your registration was last renewed, or you joined the register. Of those 35 hours of CPD, at least 20 must have included participatory learning.

Professional Bodies

The main professional body for registered nurses is the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC). In order to practise as a registered nurse in the UK you must be listed on the NMC register: this will demonstrate to potential employers that you are fully qualified and that your knowledge base within the field is up to date.

You may also wish to join the Royal College of Nursing, which is a body that represents nurses, midwives, student nurses, health care assistants, assistant practitioners, nursing degree apprentices and trainee nursing associates across the UK. Whilst membership to the Royal College of Nursing is optional, benefits include access to professional development opportunities, workplace representation is any issues arise, confidential member support services both online and on the phone, and access to exclusive member discounts too. Joining a professional body devoted to your field is also a great way to demonstrate your dedication to your profession, and to improving your skills.