Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 I think it is difficult to look at the establishment of school nurses because in some areas nurses are called school nurses but they do not have the qualification (you know a big bugbear of mine). But I guess the best estimates could come from the CPHVA and RCN as both have conducted surveys in the past. Whether or not that would give the whole time equivalents I do not know. I was under the impression that there were only a few thousand. However, in areas that have taken up skill mix then the numbers of bodies might have increased but these would not necessarily be school nurse trained. In my area the Clinical Team Leader has a small caseload and is part of the SN establishment, other areas probably have managers not included. Our establishment is about 6.50 wte but this is based on historical F grades but now is made up of a mix of H, G, E, D and B. The DOH do not seem to bother with SNs so that is probably why they have no idea how many there are. Isn't that curious when one considers all the initiatives -Teenage Pregnancy, Children's Fund, Connexions, Healthy schools and so on that include the health of school age children - Loads of money around, loads of new posts because this isn't being addressed - the fact that SNs have been addressing the issues as best they can! Invisible service or what! Nicky Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 Hello everyone I am preparing a conference paper about the workforce for children and am having difficulty identifying figures for the national establishment of school nurses. Last time I asked the DH statistics division, they told me that no figures were collated nationally for school nurses, with the result that cited figures seem to range between 20,000 and 2000. The former is definitely a wildly optimistic 'in your dreams' statistic, but is the latter too pessimistic? Really, I need whole time equivalents, rather than headcount, but even an informed approximation would help. I have sent another message to DH statistics division, does anyone have any other ideas/suggestions please? Best wishes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 Regarding school nurse numbers, the last figure I heard was between 2,000 and 2,500 most of whom are part time. I am unsure of the whole time equivalent, and don’t forget we are nearly all term time only as well. Most of us have between 10 and 20 schools each to cover. With the recent introduction of skill mix there are some staff nurses and nursery nurses/health support workers doing some of the more routine work but who do not have a school nurse qualification – how many I would not care to guess. Pat of CPHVA is probably the best person to contact. Barbara school nursing numbers? Hello everyone I am preparing a conference paper about the workforce for children and am having difficulty identifying figures for the national establishment of school nurses. Last time I asked the DH statistics division, they told me that no figures were collated nationally for school nurses, with the result that cited figures seem to range between 20,000 and 2000. The former is definitely a wildly optimistic 'in your dreams' statistic, but is the latter too pessimistic? Really, I need whole time equivalents, rather than headcount, but even an informed approximation would help. I have sent another message to DH statistics division, does anyone have any other ideas/suggestions please? Best wishes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 Dear Nicky and This is exactly what Fiona and I have been discussing over the last week or so and, in fact, tried to get a handle on from the DH over a year ago when starting to talk about the CAMH in Primary Care Journal. Obviously, this is a key target audience for the Journal and I would like to suggest, as someone who has benefitted enormously from SENATE's ability to enable, support and network that this would be a very worthwhile exercise indeed..to go out and out to identify this group of folks and for SENATE specifically also to enable them. I would certainly like both PriMHE's Journals (and as you know, we will be signposting SENATE in every issue of each)to be enabling this whilst also helping to identify this key audience. It is completely staggering to me, ALL THE TIME, how, apart from the NIMHE currently, people at the DH etc have no idea, seeming will, or notion of how, to connect to the front-end. This comes up in Mental Health Taskforce risk analyses and all discussions about workforce..but it is like we are constantly assessing and mouthing and never DOING. Specifically, this has happened with an indescribably unimaginative group looking after the CAMHS agenda at that level and knowing who all the CAMHS people are...and dammit, its 2003 and people only just thought a year or so ago that they should!! And as you so graphically point out..look at the policy areas and programmes where these folk are CRUCIAL to delivery!! It's my turn to scream now! Let's do it! Chris Re: school nursing numbers? I think it is difficult to look at the establishment of school nurses because in some areas nurses are called school nurses but they do not have the qualification (you know a big bugbear of mine). But I guess the best estimates could come from the CPHVA and RCN as both have conducted surveys in the past. Whether or not that would give the whole time equivalents I do not know. I was under the impression that there were only a few thousand. However, in areas that have taken up skill mix then the numbers of bodies might have increased but these would not necessarily be school nurse trained. In my area the Clinical Team Leader has a small caseload and is part of the SN establishment, other areas probably have managers not included. Our establishment is about 6.50 wte but this is based on historical F grades but now is made up of a mix of H, G, E, D and B. The DOH do not seem to bother with SNs so that is probably why they have no idea how many there are. Isn't that curious when one considers all the initiatives -Teenage Pregnancy, Children's Fund, Connexions, Healthy schools and so on that include the health of school age children - Loads of money around, loads of new posts because this isn't being addressed - the fact that SNs have been addressing the issues as best they can! Invisible service or what! Nicky Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 You are right the DoH do not collect figures for school nursing. Unlike health visiting because the qualification is not mandatory school nursing as the school nurses on SENATE will know can mean many things. I am also realising there are many titles with different ones being used for different grades. The other complication is the fact that the majority of school nurses work term time only so WTE and head counts becomes even more difficult. will give you a ring later so we can chat it over. Margaret school nursing numbers? > Hello everyone > I am preparing a conference paper about the workforce for children and > am having difficulty identifying figures for the national establishment > of school nurses. Last time I asked the DH statistics division, they > told me that no figures were collated nationally for school nurses, with > the result that cited figures seem to range between 20,000 and 2000. > The former is definitely a wildly optimistic 'in your dreams' > statistic, but is the latter too pessimistic? Really, I need whole time > equivalents, rather than headcount, but even an informed approximation > would help. I have sent another message to DH statistics division, does > anyone have any other ideas/suggestions please? Best wishes > > > > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 Thanks Nicky, that is helpful. You are right about the confusing statistics; that is how health visiting stats are compiled in Scotland and it is difficult to disentangle what exactly is happening. The 'skillmix' confounding of figures is also a good wheeze for hiding unfilled/longstanding vacancies and reductions in funding. I understand there is some serious workforce planning going on to try and address the multiplicity of posts and people concerned with children and families of all ages, now. I guess we all have to do whatever we can to try and make sure that the 'health' agenda is fully represented in this planning, which is happening under the auspices of the children's NSF and planning for the forthcoming green paper about child protection. As it falls under new Sure Start and the Children and Family Unit (OPDM at government level), and as the Department of Health tends to focus only on nursing in the NHS in its workforce planning and service commissioning, it is often difficult to get 'in there,' but we need to stay alert if only so school nurses and health visitors can be aware of what next will be expected of them! Kind regards Nicjaybj@... wrote: > >I think it is difficult to look at the establishment of school nurses >because in some areas nurses are called school nurses but they do not have >the qualification (you know a big bugbear of mine). But I guess the best >estimates could come from the CPHVA and RCN as both have conducted surveys >in the past. Whether or not that would give the whole time equivalents I do >not know. >I was under the impression that there were only a few thousand. However, in >areas that have taken up skill mix then the numbers of bodies might have >increased but these would not necessarily be school nurse trained. >In my area the Clinical Team Leader has a small caseload and is part of the >SN establishment, other areas probably have managers not included. Our >establishment is about 6.50 wte but this is based on historical F grades >but now is made up of a mix of H, G, E, D and B. >The DOH do not seem to bother with SNs so that is probably why they have no >idea how many there are. Isn't that curious when one considers all the >initiatives -Teenage Pregnancy, Children's Fund, Connexions, Healthy schools >and so on that include the health of school age children - Loads of money >around, loads of new posts because this isn't being addressed - the fact that >SNs have been addressing the issues as best they can! Invisible service or >what! >Nicky > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 8, 2003 Report Share Posted March 8, 2003 Thanks Barbara. I had rather hoped that 2000 might have the lowest estimate of whole time equivalents; obviously I should have been more pessimistic! It is helpful to know that school nurses cover between 10 and 20 schools though, because I speculated that the high figure (20,050) that isaw cited may have come from schools being asked if they had a school nurse. I have no idea how many schools there are, but probably that figure would make more sense. best wishes Barbara -Todd wrote: Regarding school nurse numbers, the last figure I heard was between 2,000 and 2,500 most of whom are part time. I am unsure of the whole time equivalent, and don’t forget we are nearly all term time only as well. Most of us have between 10 and 20 schools each to cover. With the recent introduction of skill mix there are some staff nurses and nursery nurses/health support workers doing some of the more routine work but who do not have a school nurse qualification – how many I would not care to guess. Pat of CPHVA is probably the best person to contact. Barbara Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 9, 2003 Report Share Posted March 9, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 9, 2003 Report Share Posted March 9, 2003 Oh dear; a former school governor colleague tells me there are about 25,000 schools in England. So my speculation would be unhelpful, as it suggests there may be as many as 5000 schools without access to a school nurse! Cowley wrote: Thanks Barbara. I had rather hoped that 2000 might have the lowest estimate of whole time equivalents; obviously I should have been more pessimistic! It is helpful to know that school nurses cover between 10 and 20 schools though, because I speculated that the high figure (20,050) that isaw cited may have come from schools being asked if they had a school nurse. I have no idea how many schools there are, but probably that figure would make more sense. best wishes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 9, 2003 Report Share Posted March 9, 2003 Is there any way into this as well via the Healthy Schools Initiative..have they mapped any of this yet + DfES? -----Original Message-----From: Cowley [mailto:sarah@...]Sent: 09 March 2003 13:06 Subject: Re: school nursing numbers?Oh dear; a former school governor colleague tells me there are about 25,000 schools in England. So my speculation would be unhelpful, as it suggests there may be as many as 5000 schools without access to a school nurse! Cowley wrote: Thanks Barbara. I had rather hoped that 2000 might have the lowest estimate of whole time equivalents; obviously I should have been more pessimistic! It is helpful to know that school nurses cover between 10 and 20 schools though, because I speculated that the high figure (20,050) that isaw cited may have come from schools being asked if they had a school nurse. I have no idea how many schools there are, but probably that figure would make more sense. best wishes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 9, 2003 Report Share Posted March 9, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 9, 2003 Report Share Posted March 9, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 9, 2003 Report Share Posted March 9, 2003 I had this reply from a colleague in another area: “I agree it would be really hard to establish how many school nurses there are though, except I suppose those who have completed the specialist practitioner course have it added at NMC level. That number would be easily identified by them but not for others. For instance in my area we only have two trained school nurses out of 10, but we all hold the same title. Perhaps all PCTs should be asked for their current numbers, current grades, specialist posts, case load numbers etc on a regular basis in order to map services to school aged children and young people regionally and nationally.” And another “I agree that many people call themselves school nurses without the qualification. This would not happen if a staff nurse was working with a HV or DN sister. Here in Preston we call our staff nurses staff nurse school health and only nurses with the training are school nurses. We have skill mix of staff nurses and HCSW and this has greatly reduced the numbers of School Nurses. I feel that wiith agenda for chnage coming along we should be very rigorous about who we let management call school nurses.I am sure that there must be Govt. numbers somewhere of nurses who have the qualification.” Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 9, 2003 Report Share Posted March 9, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 9, 2003 Report Share Posted March 9, 2003 Thanks; that may be worth trying Chris. Sadly, I rather think that the wildly over-optimistic 20,000 figure was coming from that direction, which may explain why they have so many unrealistic expectations of what school nurses can achieve. For the purposees of my conference paper, the fact that nobody really knows is sufficient; but I will try and track something down, because it is clearly of much wider importance! Manning wrote: Is there any way into this as well via the Healthy Schools Initiative..have they mapped any of this yet + DfES? Re: school nursing numbers? Oh dear; a former school governor colleague tells me there are about 25,000 schools in England. So my speculation would be unhelpful, as it suggests there may be as many as 5000 schools without access to a school nurse! Cowley wrote: Thanks Barbara. I had rather hoped that 2000 might have the lowest estimate of whole time equivalents; obviously I should have been more pessimistic! It is helpful to know that school nurses cover between 10 and 20 schools though, because I speculated that the high figure (20,050) that isaw cited may have come from schools being asked if they had a school nurse. I have no idea how many schools there are, but probably that figure would make more sense. best wishes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 9, 2003 Report Share Posted March 9, 2003 Many thanks Barbara; this is helpful. I will try and find out how many have a specialist qualification/specialist practitioner recorded with NMC. That may not give the full picture, though, as school nurses could have the qualification but not be working as school nurses. We know, for example, that there are about 23,000 registered health visitors, but only half that number working, UK-wide, as health visitors. If I get up to date statistics from DH about HV numbers, I will post them on Senate. best wishes Barbara -Todd wrote: I had this reply from a colleague in another area: “I agree it would be really hard to establish how many school nurses there are though, except I suppose those who have completed the specialist practitioner course have it added at NMC level. That number would be easily identified by them but not for others. For instance in my area we only have two trained school nurses out of 10, but we all hold the same title. Perhaps all PCTs should be asked for their current numbers, current grades, specialist posts, case load numbers etc on a regular basis in order to map services to school aged children and young people regionally and nationally.” And another “I agree that many people call themselves school nurses without the qualification. This would not happen if a staff nurse was working with a HV or DN sister. Here in Preston we call our staff nurses staff nurse school health and only nurses with the training are school nurses. We have skill mix of staff nurses and HCSW and this has greatly reduced the numbers of School Nurses. I feel that wiith agenda for chnage coming along we should be very rigorous about who we let management call school nurses.I am sure that there must be Govt. numbers somewhere of nurses who have the qualification.” Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 9, 2003 Report Share Posted March 9, 2003 Dear I'm sure this is well worth doing in any event. I am hopeful that we can target the new Journal at this group, whilst growing it and finding out who is in it at the same time. Chris. -----Original Message-----From: Cowley [mailto:sarah@...]Sent: 09 March 2003 20:20 Subject: Re: school nursing numbers?Thanks; that may be worth trying Chris. Sadly, I rather think that the wildly over-optimistic 20,000 figure was coming from that direction, which may explain why they have so many unrealistic expectations of what school nurses can achieve. For the purposees of my conference paper, the fact that nobody really knows is sufficient; but I will try and track something down, because it is clearly of much wider importance! Manning wrote: Is there any way into this as well via the Healthy Schools Initiative..have they mapped any of this yet + DfES? -----Original Message-----From: Cowley [mailto:sarah@...]Sent: 09 March 2003 13:06 Subject: Re: school nursing numbers?Oh dear; a former school governor colleague tells me there are about 25,000 schools in England. So my speculation would be unhelpful, as it suggests there may be as many as 5000 schools without access to a school nurse! Cowley wrote: Thanks Barbara. I had rather hoped that 2000 might have the lowest estimate of whole time equivalents; obviously I should have been more pessimistic! It is helpful to know that school nurses cover between 10 and 20 schools though, because I speculated that the high figure (20,050) that isaw cited may have come from schools being asked if they had a school nurse. I have no idea how many schools there are, but probably that figure would make more sense. best wishes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 9, 2003 Report Share Posted March 9, 2003 I shall be out of the university until Monday next, March 10th. If your message is urgent please contact either one of my colleagues, Frances Appleby on 0207-815-8014 or n Frost on 0207-815-8461 Betty Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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