Final-year students prepare to join NHS frontline

  • Emma Wilkinson's report features student nurses George Johnson and Sommer Booth, Dr Toni Schwarz (Dean for the College of Health and Wellbeing at Sheffield Hallam) Grace Greenwood (student nurse at the University of York) and Prof Una Macleod (Dean of Hull York Medical School).

Hundreds of healthcare students studying at our region's universities are being drafted in to join the frontline fight against coronavirus.

Never before have final-year students joined the workforce early in this way, so institutions like Sheffield Hallam University are putting on special sessions to help make sure students are prepared and feel confident.

More than 600 final-year nursing and allied health students, who are in the final six months of their degrees at Sheffield Hallam, have signed up to become paid volunteers.

The posts will support key staff involved in the fight against the virus and will take the form of an extended placement. The students will be paid, and can opt in or out of the scheme at any time.

The university says the students will be supervised and will only be doing tasks within their scope of practice. But given the current situation, they are being prepared for a higher than normal level of independence and responsibility.

Simulation sessions at Sheffield Hallam University

Training sessions are being delivered by academics from Sheffield Hallam's College of Health, Wellbeing and Life Sciences to help prepare students for the frontline. The sessions are providing the latest Covid-19 guidance, oxygen therapy, advice on how the students can look after their own mental wellbeing and guidance on the necessary personal protection equipment.

Grace Greenwood, third year BSc in Adult Nursing at University of York

Grace Greenwood, a third-year nursing student at the University of York, is starting her placement at York Hospital within the next few days. She echoes the feelings of many fellow students who are both positive about the unique learning opportunity and nervous about what awaits them.

She said: "I'm quite scared because although I am a student nurse, I'm also someone's daughter, granddaughter and sister so putting myself on the frontline, particularly on the Covid-19 high-dependency unit, is quite daunting."