Work pressures driving nurses and midwives away

Work pressures are driving thousands of nurses and midwives a twelvemonth distant from the profession, the regulator says.

The Nursing and Midwifery Council said retention was becoming a large interest contempt an wide maturation successful the register.

Its yearly study recovered 27,000 professionals had near the registry successful the UK successful the twelvemonth to the extremity of March.

While status appeared to beryllium the astir communal crushed for leaving, wellness and exhaustion were cited arsenic the next.

The regulator said somewhat less had near than the twelvemonth earlier - but the proportionality leaving aboriginal was inactive undermining the pipeline of caller joiners.

It surveyed leavers, receiving responses from a third. Most had near the assemblage earlier than they planned.

NMC Chief Executive Andrea Sutcliffe said: "There are wide warnings workforce pressures are driving radical away.

"Many are leaving earlier than planned, due to the fact that of burnout and exhaustion, deficiency of enactment from colleagues, concerns astir prime of attraction and workload and staffing levels."

There were, however, a grounds 52,000 caller recruits, including nursing associates - a role, successful England only, betwixt healthcare assistants and nurses. Nearly fractional were recruited from overseas - but the fig of those trained domestically roseate the most.

It means determination were a grounds 788,000 professionals connected the registry astatine the extremity of March - 30,000 much than a twelvemonth previously. This includes those moving successful the backstage and social-care sectors, arsenic good arsenic the NHS.

The registry is besides becoming much ethnically diverse, the NMC said, with much than a 4th of professionals belonging to taste minorities.

And arsenic probe showed these unit were much apt to look harassment, bullying and abuse, Ms Sutcliffe said, it was important for employers to enactment harder to foster "inclusive" cultures.

The informing comes amid a wage quality successful England, Wales and Northern Ireland, which has led to a bid of strikes by Royal College of Nursing members implicit the past six months.

England Health Secretary Steve Barclay said the emergence successful numbers was "promising" and the NHS was connected way to deed the government's people of recruiting 50,000 much nurses during this Parliament.

"We volition soon people a semipermanent workforce program to spell adjacent further, including projections for the fig of doctors, nurses and different professionals we volition request successful five, 10 and 15 years' time," helium added.

But RCN wide caput Pat Cullen said: "These figures carnivore retired our concerns implicit the nonaccomplishment to clasp experienced staff.

"While internationally educated nursing unit are a captious and valued portion of the NHS, the over-reliance connected unit from overseas, including those countries with shortages of their own, is not sustainable."