The entry of Massey University into the Auckland nursing degree market will not overstretch the region’s clinical placements, says Massey and its partner Waitemata District Health Board.
The first cohort of 35 students, based at Massey’s Albany campus are due to start their degree next month bringing the number of Auckland nursing programmes back up to five after the shelving of Te Whare Wananga o Awanuiarangi’s programme.
Both Massey and Waitemata DHB believe there is room for the fifth programme and Nursing Council has given them the stamp of approval.
Annette Huntington, head of Massey’s nursing school, said Massey didn’t see itself in competition in any way with the University of Auckland or AUT schools. She said both those programmes received “enormous” numbers of applications for limited places and the 80 applications Massey Albany programme, that was late to be advertised, showed there was demand.
Huntington said Massey had wanted to be able to offer its nursing degree across all three Massey campuses. At the same time the Albany area and the Waitemata DHB were growing rapidly so it thought there was room to offer a small programme, with numbers to be capped at 50 a year from 2014.
“And we got a reassurance from the local DHB that as long we kept to a very small number, and were able to be flexible about placements, that it could be absorbed.”
Jocelyn Peach, Waitemata’s director of nursing, said the university first approached the board two years ago to discuss clinical placements. She said the board looked carefully at whether there was room for another nursing programme and believed there was as long as schools were flexible and worked together. “I believe there is capacity if the schools look to provide experience across the 24 hours and seven days. Massey appears to be the most flexible of the schools.”
Huntington said how flexible clinical placements would be was under negotiation and would be influenced by ongoing national discussions on greater flexibility including rostering and rotating shifts for some students. Huntington said Massey’s senior students were already placed on rostered and rotating shifts with their preceptor in year three.
The Albany students first placement was to be spread across the 57 aged care facilities in the DHB and later placements would be at North Shore Hospital and primary health providers acrosss Waitemata.
Massey and Waitemata DHB signed a ‘heads of agreement’ in September last year to build closer links including collaboration over the nursing degree programme.
Peach said the benefits of the collaborative programme was that students did their clinical experience “exclusively in our community” giving them the chance to form relationships with DHB staff and other health providers, as well as to develop in-depth insight into community needs and how they are met. “This programme is focused on the students having a strong identity with our district and our DHB,” Peach said.
She said the region’s nursing schools had negotiated for 16,862 clinical days for 2012 and she was confident Waitemata could accommodate the additional requirements of Massey.
“Our challenge is that the schools often want placements at the same time and we cannot over book for the wards and units who are also preceptoring new graduates, return to practice colleagues and new staff.”
