Community Nursing

You will assess the healthcare needs of patients and families, monitor the quality of care they’re receiving and be professionally accountable for delivery of care. Your patients can be of any age, but often many of them will be elderly, while others may have been recently discharged from hospital, be terminally ill or have physical disabilities.

You may be visiting patients every day or more than once a day, offering help, advice and support. You may work on your own or with other groups, such as the social services, voluntary agencies and other NHS organisations and help to provide and co-ordinate a wide range of care services.

You must be a qualified and registered nurse and will need to undertake further training. You will need to be adaptable and resourceful, working in a variety of workplaces and without the resources of a hospital at hand.

As well as providing direct patient care, district nurses also have a teaching and support role, working with patients to enable them to care for themselves or with family members teaching them how to give care to their relatives. They are also accountable for their own patient caseloads.