Service Users
- Do you have experience of healthcare services as a patient?
- Are you a carer for someone who accesses healthcare?
- Would you like to share your experiences to influence the education of new healthcare workers?
The School of Nursing, Midwifery and Health Education recognises the important contribution that service users and carers make to the quality of healthcare education.
By sharing your experience with students, academics and practitioners you can influence the design, delivery and evaluation of our healthcare courses. Service users also positively contribute to the recruitment and assessment of students.
We are committed to working in partnership with service users to influence the future development and healthcare education and healthcare workers studying at the University of Bedfordshire.
We are looking for volunteers so we can expand our current team of service users. We would love to hear from you if you would like more information about this role. Please email us at Volunteerconnect@beds.ac.uk or complete this form to volunteer
Policy
The School has a Service User and Carer Involvement Policy that sets out what we hope to achieve by enhancing the input that they have across the curricula. The Policy outlines its purpose, scope and process.
Service User and Carer Involvement in the School of Nursing, Midwifery and Health Education
The School of Nursing, Midwifery and Health Education recognises the important contribution that service users and carers make to the delivery of healthcare education. By sharing their experience with students, academics and practitioners they can influence the curriculum design, delivery, management and evaluation and the recruitment and assessment of students.
The professional, statutory and regulatory bodies involved in Healthcare require service user and carer involvement in all aspects of the curriculum.
For example, the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC 2018) Realising professionalism: Standards for education and training Part 1: Standards framework for nursing and midwifery education states:
approved education institutions, together with practice learning partners, must … ensure programmes are designed, developed, delivered, evaluated and co-produced with service users and other stakeholders.
They advise that service users contribute to student recruitment, selection and assessment. The Health Care and Professions Council expect service users and carers to be involved in admissions and selection procedures, including shortlisting, interviewing, monitoring and evaluation of courses, activities to support learning and quality assurance processes.
The aims of service user / carer involvement within healthcare education within the University are to:
- Enable service users /carers to play a key role in the education and training of the healthcare workforce by being involved in the design, development, delivery, evaluation and co-production of the curriculum.
- Give local people a say in how students are recruited, educated and assessed.
- Ensure that there is a consistent approach to service user / carer involvement.
- Promote service user / carer involvement as an ongoing and integrated component of the University’s activity.
Service users and carers contribute to the students’ learning experiences by:
- Actively participating in the recruitment and selection of students
- Providing teaching opportunities for students where they provide a unique perspective and insight into their experiences of both being cared for and caring for others
- Participating in the review and development of the curriculum, from design through to evaluation
- Attending Portfolio Executive Committees
- Assessing students alongside practice learning partners and academics
- Involvement in research opportunities
- Participating as a panel member, on fitness to practise panels.
You can volunteer with the university at any time. The only criteria is that you must have used the health service or have experience of caring for another person.
People who apply to help us come from a wide range of backgrounds, cultures, ages and religions. This is important as it we reflect on the types of patients and clients that our students will meet in practice settings, and the impact their stories shared has on them.
As a volunteer you will be provided with an induction session to introduce you to the University. You will be allocated a member of the academic team to liaise with and support you in your chosen role. They will ensure that you are provided with information on our courses, your role and interview training, to assist you in your decision making.
Service users and carers can claim reasonable travel expenses when teaching or assessing students.
If you would like to discuss the group or would like to contribute to it then please contact Debbie Buck at Debbie.buck@beds.ac.uk
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