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Sparks fly over whether nurses should work outside their skill set

Mixed views on whether nurses should agree to work in clinical areas outside their usual skill set sparked an impassioned debate at congress

Claire Shields said she is ashamed of nurses who refuse to help other nurses.
Picture: John Houlihan

Mixed views on the risks and benefits of NHS staff being redeployed to clinical areas in which they do not normally work sparked an impassioned debate at RCN congress in Belfast on Sunday.

RCN Northern Ireland southern branch secretary Colleen White led a discussion in which healthcare professionals spoke of their experience of being asked to cover wards in areas which they are unpractised.

Ms White said: ‘Can nurses work anywhere despite being unpractised in that area, and not pose a risk to patients?'

She said she had refused to work on a ward in which she had no expertise because she would have been unable to care for the patients effectively or safely.

Courage to say no

But she said nurses sometimes lacked the courage to say no to redeployment, adding that another nurse provided the cover she had refused. ‘That poor girl went and worked in that ward despite her fears… I heard she had a horrendous night,’ she said.

Ms White argued that redeployment was yet another example of nurses being asked to solve staffing issues that should be resolved by the government.

She urged nurses to refuse to be redeployed if they did not have the appropriate skill set.

‘How on earth can we work within the Nursing and Midwifery Council code when we are working in unfamiliar environments and are unpractised in that area of care,’ she said.

‘I ask you to work within your code, stand up for effective care, express concerns formally and demand a level of supervision. Stand up for patients, that’s what we are here for.’

Refusal to help

Isle of Wight ward sister Claire Shields said she had been affected by staff refusing to cover her work.

‘I used to be so shocked and horrified when I had patients who needed care and I would get calls at the end of the day saying "Sorry Claire we’ve got no one for you, people are refusing to come from cardiac, people don’t want to come from ITU, people are saying they don’t have the skills",’ she said.

‘They are registered nurses, of course they have the skills.’

Ms Shields added: ‘When nurses refuse to help other nurses and the patients that are at the heart of all we do I am ashamed of them.'

Plenty they could do

Other nurses spoke of the benefits of redeployment.

Emergency nurse Roisin Devlin said: ‘Following the worst winter that emergency departments across the UK have seen, I have to say I was absolutely delighted to see some non-emergency department staff redeployed to the department.

‘Was I going to put them in resuscitation? Absolutely not, but there was plenty that they could do for the patients that were there.’

Ms Devlin said it was completely understandable that some nurses felt uncomfortable when asked to redeploy but that the alternative was worse.

‘I absolutely understand the frustration and the concerns of those staff being moved,’ she said.

‘But the thought of leaving so many vulnerable emergency care patients waiting on beds without anybody to look after them makes my heart run cold.’

Selling themselves short

Fellow emergency nurse Natasha Bolt echoed Ms Devlin’s comments, saying nurses were ‘selling themselves short’ by refusing to be redeployed.

‘Yes we have specialist skills, and that’s wonderful and we have to work within our NMC code and highlight when we are uncomfortable,’ she said.

‘But essential nursing care is a skill we all have.’

Ms Bolt added: ‘I have been so grateful to nurses who have identified they are outside of their skill set but have still come and they’ve helped feed patients, they’ve given medication, rolled patients, changed pads, they’ve mucked in.'


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