Register with the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC): your graduate career depends upon it

The NMC defines competencies to be attained by nursing students within one of the four branches: adult, mental health, learning disabilities and children's nursing. There are separate competencies for midwifery students to achieve.

• Achieving the competencies means that you are ‘fit to practise' and eligible for registration which, in turn, assures the public that you have a minimum set of knowledge, skills and competencies for safe and effective practice.
• Employers and the public can verify that you have current effective registration with the NMC.

How do nurses gain from the introduction of a re-registration policy?

The key purpose of registration is to protect the public rather than you, the registrant. Registration and re-registration provides a ‘live' register that can be accessed by employers and the public who need to ascertain that the nurses and midwives whose services they wish to use are ‘fit to practise'. However as a registrant you will find that the evidence of your practice and personal professional development will be useful in your annual appraisal interviews with your managers and in the construction of personal development plans as required for implementation of the Knowledge and Skills Framework (DH 2003). 

What is the procedure for registration?

• Your education provider will confirm to the NMC that you have successfully completed an approved pre-registration programme.
• Complete an application for registration and pay the required fee to the NMC. Forms are available on the NMC website. Since August 2004 a new register has been in place which has introduced an additional requirement that you declare that you are of good health and good character, sufficient for safe and effective practice.
• The registered nurse teacher responsible for the nursing programme you have undertaken will sign a supporting declaration to affirm that to the best of their knowledge you have good health and are of good character (previously the requirement was for good character only).

When will I need to re-register with the NMC?

You will be required to re-register every three years. The NMC set the current requirements for re-registration in the mid 1990s; these are 35 hours of learning activity over the three years preceding re-registration and 750 hours of practice in the five years preceding re-registration, both to be recorded in a personal professional profile. These periods of time had to elapse before the first registrants could be asked for evidence and therefore the requirements have only been fully implemented since the beginning of this decade. You will be asked three years after you first register whether you have met these requirements.

In the near future the NMC will review this procedure. Registrants are now familiar with meeting the current requirements and the changing role of nurses makes it vital that you keep your knowledge and skills up to date.

With thanks to Janice Gosby, head of research and special projects at the Nursing and Midwifery Council.