Student-led wards: can they boost clinical skills and confidence?

Nursing students are leading the way on collaborative learning programmes where students make decisions about care and gain hands-on clinical experience

When Beth Dennis first set foot on a hospital ward as a Birmingham City University nursing student she felt underprepared.

COVID-19 had disrupted everything, including face-to-face learning and time to practise clinical skills. Many of her student peers had worked previously in healthcare, but Ms Dennis had entered nursing straight from school. ‘I basically knew nothing,’ she says.

A way for students to learn from each other

But by her second year, with more experience, she felt she could offer help to others starting out who felt as anxious as she had.