This course is for NMC registered nurses who want to gain a professional qualification in health visiting or occupational health nursing or school nursing. If you have either a Diploma or Advanced Diploma in nursing studies this course can be studied at degree level to top up your qualification.
During this course you will:
- Develop the skills you need to become a practitioner in your own area of expertise, and work as a specialist public health nurse
- Learn how to share the core values of a practitioner with your colleagues to help them with their professional development
- Build up your skills in clinical practice, care and programme management, leadership, and public health, which will be essential when you become a practitioner
- Enhance your research skills that will help you to look at the quality of care in your current practice and suggest improvements
- Improve your understanding of professional roles and functions by networking, team building and communicating with other professionals.
Practice Assessment will encompass all the four domains of care, facilitation of learning, leadership and management, research and development.
We’re proud to say that our courses are closely mapped against the health and social care sector. This ensures that our curriculum is up-to-date, providing you with the assurance that your learning is current and relevant. This does mean that we do have to respond to national changes such as government policy. As a result, some of the information about our courses may change.
By completing this programme you will be able to demonstrate a critical understanding of clinical practice, care and caseload management, clinical practice leadership and clinical practice development to enable you to become an independent prescriber. Whilst studying on this programme you will spend equal amounts of time in practice and the learning environment.
You’ll also have the opportunity to go on an additional placement of your choice for three weeks. Placement hours are subject to change.
You will study modules such as:
Stage one
- Evidence Based Project.
- Leading for Quality
- Principles of Practice Assessment
- Public Health and Health Promotion.
You will also have the opportunity to choose two other modules from a range of options including V100 Prescribing, V300 Non Medical Prescribing, Child Development, Clinical supervision and many more.
Please note that our modules are subject to change - we review the content of our courses regularly, making changes where necessary to improve your experience and graduate prospects.
You’ll be taught in a variety of ways, such as clinical practical sessions, group discussions and lectures. You’ll spend half of your time on practice placement, so you’ll get the hands-on experience as well as learning the theory at University.
How you're assessed
You will be assessed through exams, observations, assignments, a presentation and a practice portfolio. You will also be assessed on your placement by your practice teacher.
Real world learning
External specialists in their field of practice actively the support the delivery of the programme. Examples include guest lecturers in the following areas: Safeguarding, Child and Infant Feeding, Children in Care, Child and Adolescent Mental Health, Commissioning and many more.
Who you will meet
Navjot Virk is the Programme Leader, a Health Visitor and the HV pathway leader, with interests in child development, education and vulnerable families.
Erica Lloyd is the School Nurse Pathway Lead. Her research interests include sex education and parenting support of vulnerable families, Leadership and Quality Improvements.
Neil Loach is the Occupational Health Pathway Lead and has interests in health protection, risk management, sickness absence management and Clinical Supervision.
2024 entry
These are the typical qualification requirements for September 2024 entry.
may apply to students who meet certain criteria.
| Requirement | What we're looking for | | UCAS points | 80 |
| A Level | CDD |
| BTEC | N/A |
| GCSE | N/A |
| Access to HE | N/A |
To join the course you will need an NVQ (QCF) level 3 qualification or equivalent.
Additional entry requirements
English language requirements
IELTS: 6.0 (with at least 5.5 in each skills area)
2025/26
| | Full-time | Part-time |
|---|
| UK | £9,535 per year | £1,190 per 20 credit module |
| International | N/A | N/A |
Further information about our fees and support you may be entitled to.
How to apply
Please look at our before you apply.
When you have completed this course, you will be able to apply for registration on part three of the Nursing and Midwifery Council register. This will allow you to practice as a Specialist Community Public Health Nurse in the UK.
When you graduate you will:
- Have the skills to become an effective specialist nurse in your chosen area of expertise
- Be committed to lifelong learning, encourage colleagues to be, and contribute to national debates
- Be able to master clinical practice, care and programme management, clinical practice leadership, and clinical practice development
- Show leadership and have a critical in depth knowledge of professional roles and functions, so you can bring about integrated and high quality health and social care, through working with other professionals effectively, networking and team working
- Have knowledge and skills in evaluating current research and evidence based practice so you can influence and deliver high quality care.
If you need any more information from us, eg on courses, accommodation, applying, car parking, fees or funding, please contact us and we will do everything we can to help you.
Contact us Contact us Teaching hours
Like most universities, we operate extended teaching hours at the University of Derby, so contact time with your lecturers and tutors could be anytime between 9am and 9pm. Your timetable will usually be available on the website 24 hours after enrolment on to your course.
Course updates
The information provided on this page is correct at the time of publication but course content, costs and other individual course details do change from time to time and are updated as often as possible, so please do check these pages again when making your final decision to apply for a course. Any updated course details will also be confirmed to you at application, enrolment and in your offer letter.
If you are thinking about transferring onto this course (into the second year for example), you should contact the programme leader for the relevant course information as modules may vary from those shown on this page.
Minimum numbers
Please note that this course is subject to minimum numbers in order to run.
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