Children's Nursing

Our child nursing programme combines theory and practice to consolidate your knowledge and clinical skills in acute, chronic and complex care of children and young people.

Our dynamic and NMC-accredited curriculum ensures you will qualify with knowledge and skills to deliver safe and effective care, which is responsive to the changing climate in children and young people’s nursing. 

It will develop your understanding of contemporary issues in children’s nursing and the importance of a family-centred approach to assess, plan, implement and evaluate safe and effective care.

Children’s nurses play an integral role in acute and community healthcare settings. As such, we work closely with our practice partners to offer a breadth and depth of placements throughout the programme. You can explore opportunities in specialised areas, such as Primary Care, palliative care, Teenage Cancer Trust Unit, neonatal units, children’s intensive care, and at one of the world's busiest ECMO centres with one of the only remaining Diana Children's Nursing Teams in the UK. 

Placements are typically provided across the East Midlands, in Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland and sometimes in surrounding counties. In your placement, you will work alongside practice supervisors and practice assessors to learn the practical application of nursing relevant to your chosen field.  

This course is structured through Inter-Professional (IP) learning. Allowing you to collaborate with other allied healthcare students and professionals and gain a wider understand of issues and debates in the sector. 

We encourage you to challenge yourself, completing a variety of assessments to demonstrate theoretical knowledge and practical skills. You will develop expert communication skills, an understanding of cognitive development and how this influence both childhood perception of illness and care delivery. During the course, students also have access to updated facilities, utilising simulation suites, Virtual Reality technology, and LearningSpace software.

You will share learning opportunities with students from the other fields of nursing practice but an also engage in field of practice specific learning opportunities throughout the programme, to ensure that you develop your identity, knowledge and skills within the child nursing field of practice.

Key features

Study in our newly renovated facilities which comprise of simulated clinical settings and the latest teaching technology allowing you to practice your nursing skills in a safe and supportive environment.

Our strong links with local NHS trusts, private healthcare providers and charity organisations allow our students to gain practical experience in a range of placement settings throughout all three years of the course.

DMU students can gain valuable international experience as part of their studies with the DMU Global programme.

Uniform policy

All students will be required to adhere to a uniform policy when in practice, in which they must be bare below the elbow. This is non-negotiable as it is an infection prevention requirement to safeguard the health and safety of all students and service users.