OVERVIEW

• 9th in the UK for Nursing (Guardian University Guide, 2024)
• 93% overall student satisfaction in the 2022 National Student Survey (NSS)
• Opportunities to learn across a diverse range of placements

Do you feel passionate about health and social inclusion for those who are more vulnerable in society? Do you believe everyone deserves to live a fulfilling life whilst maintaining their independence? If the answer is yes, Learning Disabilities Nursing is the profession for you. As a Learning Disabilities Nurse, you’ll have the challenging yet rewarding job of caring for people with a range of needs. You’ll also work in partnership with family, carers and specialist healthcare professionals, promoting health and wellbeing, to ensure that people with learning disabilities reach their full potential.  

Right from the start you’ll receive a blend of theory and practical experience. Half the course will be spent at the University. The other half?of your time,?you’ll gain real life work experience work skills in?a variety of settings. We’ll engage your passion and interest in working with people with learning disabilities and/autism.  

You’ll develop knowledge and skills they will rely on and depend upon to support their physical, psychological and mental health needs. This incredibly rewarding programme of study will see you fulfilled in a multitude of ways. Rewarded by the achievement of that ultimate goal of seeing first-hand the improved mental and physical well-being of somebody who may not have been able to experience this without your knowledge and skills. Rewarded by your individual learning and growth in practical and theoretical confidence, rewarded by the company you keep with your peers and teachers who share your passion and are like-minded in their pursuit for enhancing lives.  

We are a diverse academic team with an impressive profile of expertise. We are researchers, authors, clinical practitioners, qualified teachers and policymakers and our portfolio is enhanced by lived experience of intellectual disabilities and autism.

By the time you graduate, you’ll be ready to choose which area of Learning Disabilities Nursing you would like to pursue as a career. Our graduates hold a variety of positions including community nurses, inpatient nurses, forensic nurses, liaison nurses in general hospitals, specialist nurses within autistic services, prison nurses and others. You could also receive between £5,000 and £8,000 a year to help fund your studies and the good news is that you won’t have to pay back a penny.  

Be that voice for those who may be overlooked by society. Be the one that upholds the rights of people with learning disabilities. Be a Learning Disabilities Nurse.

What's the course about?

Your time at the University  

You’ll spend 50% of your time here. You’ll develop your theory in different learning environments including lecture theatres, smaller seminars, group tutorials completing projects, discussions, spending time in our new clinical labs practising simulated skills. You’ll learn how to comprehensively assess somebody’s health when they are having difficulty articulating what is wrong with them, you’ll provide a holistic care plan, considering a person’s mental, emotional and physical wellbeing. We’ll teach you how to increase a person’s motivation to undertake the actions within their care plan by increasing the ownership and placing the person within the centre of their care. Your taught theory will be supplemented by a range of online/digital learning technologies including virtual classrooms and access to hundreds of journal articles and e-books. A range of assessments will test your new knowledge and ability to apply it to practical scenarios, continuously developing your creative and innovative ways of working with people who may have very different perspectives from our own.  

Your time on a practice placement  

You’ll spend 50% of your time in a practice placement, you could be working with the NHS Trusts in Hertfordshire, Essex, Bedfordshire or in London. You’ll also find many learning disability nurses working within the private health sector, which we also utilise to extend your practical placements. You will be supervised and supported with your learning in a supernumerary and safe environment by qualified Learning Disability Nurses who remember only too well what it was like to be a student. Our practice partners are some of the most passionate and caring individuals you’ll meet, all of whom have the people they support at the centre of their practice.  

Your practice experience may involve working with a broad range of health and social care professionals and carers who support children, adults and older people who have special needs/ disabilities.

Practice learning experiences during the three-year course include:

• Community Learning Disabilities Nursing teams.  
• Assessment and treatment services.
• Forensic services.
• Day care / outreach / educational services.
• A range of residential services in health, social, and independent settings.
• Health liaison experience
• Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service Teams
• Short Term Break and Respite Services.
• A student-led experience

All practice learning experience meet Nursing and Midwifery Council requirements

In your first year, we’ll get you started with the foundations and the building blocks for further developments of knowledge and skills. You’ll begin to understand the role of a Learning Disabilities Nurse and the impact they have on the people they support and the services they work in. You’ll explore the anatomy and physiology of the human body in relation to a variety of physical health and mental health conditions. We’ll work with you to reflect upon your communication skills and understand how important they are and hear first-hand accounts of the lived experience by those who have been exposed to learning disabilities and more general health and social care institutions. As well as having people with learning disabilities and/or autism within our teaching teams, we also engage with many others who have impacted upon our recruitment, development of curricula and its delivery.

In your second year, you’ll start to explore how young people move between new services as they mature into adulthood. We’ll help you develop your understanding of the physical health needs that are more specific to people with learning disabilities and how Learning Disabilities Nurses are required to become specialists within these particular areas of health. You’ll also critically analyse research methods that inform today’s Learning Disabilities Nursing practice and recognise the importance of evidence-based practice and reflecting upon how it can influence and improve your own practice. There’ll also be the option to apply for an International module which will be delivered with students from five other higher education institutions within different countries. If selected, it’s likely you’ll be travelling to one of these countries, funded by Erasmus EU Project, to enjoy the programme delivery. This has proved to be an extremely enjoyable and well evaluated element of the programme and unique Learning Disabilities Nursing.  

In your final year, your knowledge base will be stronger which will be impacting upon your confidence to demonstrate innovative practice. We dedicate a large part of the final year to developing your imaginative and innovative skills and require you to challenge existing practices with a firm eye on improving the care and lives of the people we support. The assessment for this part of the programme will see us help you create an evidence-based proposal to effect positive change in service delivery. You’ll study leadership and management within this field of nursing and be encouraged to take a more leading role within your practical learning.

Following successful completion of the Learning Disability Nursing programme you will be entitled to apply for registration as a nurse with the Nursing and Midwifery Council UK. This registration will enable you to take advantage of the varied opportunities available to you, to put into practice all you have learned and make a positive contribution to the lives of people with learning disabilities and their families.

You will be able to seek employment in a wide range of organisations including NHS, social services and private and voluntary organisations. You will meet many interesting people throughout your career and each day will be different. You will always be learning, and developing new and innovative skills through experience and education that will enable you to diversify or specialise in a particular area of Learning Disability Nursing, giving opportunity for promotion and job satisfaction.

Following qualification there are also many opportunities to further your professional studies with courses, available at graduate level and above, to help develop your knowledge and practice.

95% of graduates are in work or doing further study 15 months after the course (Graduate Outcomes, 2019/2020).

This course entitles you to apply for registration as a learning disabilities nurse with the Nursing and Midwifery Council. This opens up a range of career options providing care within the NHS, social services and private and voluntary organisations.