Universities should appoint revalidation champions, guidance recommends

Universities should appoint 'revalidation champions' and build up accurate pictures of the number of nurse registrants they have, the Council of Deans of Health (CoDH) has recommended. 

The CoDH has published guidance advising universities on how to ensure their nursing and midwifery staff renew their registrations with the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) under the forthcoming revalidation system. 

The guidance has been developed with two universities that are among the sites piloting revalidation until July, ahead of the planned introduction of the system in October. 

The CoDH recommends that each university appoint an organisational lead on revalidation, who would have explicit responsibility for ensuring staff are prepared for the new system. The guidance states that in both pilot universities, the revalidation lead is a senior registrant staff member. 

Registrants are individually responsible for their revalidation, but the CoDH also recommends universities build up an accurate picture of who their nursing and midwifery registrants are, to prevent disruption over staff failing to revalidate.

The guidance points out that NMC registrants will work in a range of university departments, not just in the health faculty, and said one pilot university used a combination of information from its human resources department and an open call across the university to identify registrants. 

The CoDH also recommends talking to registrants about the mechanisms and timescales for revalidation and discussing it with human resources departments to address the link between annual appraisals and confirmation by a third party that the registrant has met the revalidation requirements. Potential third-party confirmers should also be alerted to revalidation and their role in the process. 

RCN head of policy Howard Catton said having an internal organisational lead is a ‘pragmatic, common sense’ approach which will aid clear communication in organisations. 

‘Universities must make sure people across their organisations are working to the same standards – that appraisal processes are not different in different parts of the organisation,' he added.

‘The organisations need to do the preparation and project management. The mechanisms of how they do it is down to them. Some organisations may have a lead, others may have a group of people, if it is a big organisation.’ 

Read the full guidance here

Read more about revalidation