MSc/PGDip/PGCert Nursing

The MSc Nursing programme is part of the School of Health Sciences postgraduate portfolio. This portfolio enables students to complete credit bearing continuous professional development modules, a postgraduate certificate, a postgraduate diploma or a master’s degree. The award of the MSc Nursing can be made on the successful completion of 180 postgraduate module credits.

The MSc Nursing programme aims to nurture innovative professional practitioners, prepared to advance their knowledge and develop nursing within their specialist fields. The programme is delivered through a series of modules, which address the four cornerstones of professional nursing at an advanced level. The MSc Nursing provides a solid foundation for the further development of nursing careers, and is suitable for people wishing to become specialist nurses, nurse managers, nurse educators and nurse researchers.

The MSc Nursing is led by a small team of experienced and dedicated nursing staff who work as part of a larger team of healthcare experts within the School of Health Sciences. All teaching is evidence based, and is informed by relevant research. Where appropriate, learning is enhanced by a multi-professional approach to teaching, which is informed by the research expertise of staff.

The MSc cohorts are small, and teaching sessions are interactive, thus enhancing each student’s learning experience by way of facilitating discovery of and engagement with a range of perspectives, ideas and backgrounds. This approach to learning and teaching promotes the value of critical thinking, problem-solving, communication, interpersonal relations, teamwork, team leadership and lifelong learning skills- all of which are highly desirable qualities valued by employers. This also helps develop the student’s sense of academic rigour.

The programme content exposes nurses to key issues and ideas relating to communication, leadership, education and research. The modular structure of the programme also allows nurses to focus their postgraduate studies on their own area of professional interest, and the dissertation module gives them an opportunity for in-depth study of their topic. A full time MSc nursing degree programme will normally be completed in 12 months of full time study.

Career prospects

The taught postgraduate programmes provide opportunity for healthcare professionals to develop, specialise and extend the scope of their skills into new areas, to meet the constantly evolving service demands for advanced practitioners. The students who exit our taught postgraduate programmes usually take up senior clinical/management positions within the NHS. We have students from multi-professional backgrounds as we encourage interprofessional learning and education as appropriate to foster understanding of the roles of colleagues.

The taught postgraduate programmes provide opportunity for healthcare professionals to develop, specialise and extend the scope of their skills into new areas, to meet the constantly evolving service demands. The students who exit our taught postgraduate programmes are equipped to take up senior clinical/management positions within the NHS.

The MSc Nursing provides a solid foundation for the further development of nursing careers, and is suitable for both UK and international nurses who wish to become specialist nurses, nurse managers, nurse educators and nurse researchers.