UCAS points difference nursing and midwifery

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I’ve been looking on my local university website and it says that nursing requires a lower amount of UCAS points than midwifery. Can I ask why this is? I’m a bit confused as I’ve also heard colleagues saying that they had to take the long route into midwifery as they didn’t achieve good enough grades for Midwifery but did get accepted onto nursing and then did the 18 month conversation degree. So does this mean that academically midwifery is harder than nursing? If so, I am shocked about why this is. Nurses work in A&E and ICU etc. Midwives don’t... although I suppose a midwife has responsibility for both a woman and baby. Could this be the reason? I’ve noticed that my trust advertise for new midwives as a band 6, but new nurses at a band 5. Im looking into a career in healthcare and would like to understand the differences in responsibility and academic work between the two.

May be as simple as supply and demand - there are a lot more students wanting to do midwifery than places, so they up the grade requirements.

I believe that it is the autonomy the midwifes have from the start of their career.
Midwifery is more specialist than nursing and is therefore arguably more intense.
Of course one can specialise as a nurse and the pay package will then reflect this (band 6-8).
I agree that the areas that nurses work in can be extremely hard and intense eg ICU, but all ICU nurses have to undergo further training.

Midwifery is the most competitive of all of the nursing courses to get into. It isn't just a case of getting enough UCAS points to get in either - lots of people who apply will not get and offer. You have to have a very strong application and do well in the interview in order to get an offer.

Childhood nursing is also very competitive. Adult nursing has more places and more candidates get offers for those places.

Midwifery is much more competitive with many more times the number of applicants for places , so the universities can be a lot more choosy. Hence the higher entry requirements. Anecdotally I have heard you also need a lot more relevant work experience to get accepted for midwifery than nursing.
Re: starting as a band 6, midwives manage the care of women in pregnancy, labour and birth without ever seeing a doctor in many cases. They are completely autonomous practitioners (where the women's case is not medically complex). Newly qualified B5 nurses and even often very experienced nurses don't practice with anything like that degree of autonomy. There are advanced practice routes in nursing where they work at a higher level with autonomy, but this wouldn't be an entry level role in nursing.

It's because there are far fewer places, and there are far, far, far more applications per place than nursing, so the answer is mainly because they can stipulate higher entry requirements, it works well as it whittles down applications even further too.

Thanks everyone, some really helpful replies, very interesting. It does all make sense now about why the two professions are so different.

I’m a midwifery lecturer and I’d say it’s a combination of two things.

Yes, supply and demand….I could fill my course 10x over. But like a previous poster mentioned traditionally midwives have always been an autonomous profession. It’s why the standard pay band is band 6 rather than band 5 for nurses. So we are the lead professional in a low risk pregnancy. Nurses are becoming increasingly autonomous especially when/if they specialise so icu, advanced nurse practitioners, nurse prescribers but they do extra post grad stuff for this.

I’ve taught on both nursing and midwifery degrees and while it’s the same amount of academic credits and same level of academic credits I would say the midwifery course is harder. For one thing they have to demonstrate by the end of year 3 that they’re at a level where they can practice autonomously, which can and will include challenging doctors if necessary.

Sorry my post wasn’t very clear…..midwives are on band 6 after their initial preceptorship period whereas nurses stay on band 5 for ever unless they are promoted.

@CovidCorvid agree. In ICU we waited 9 years for a band 6 to come up. By that point nurses are extremely experienced in that speciality and wield a lot of autonomy. We are the eyes and ears of the doctors and our ability to spot things early/take action in deteriorating patients is essential. We use complex equipment like haemofilters and vents, administer potent meds like noradrenaline. Quite frustrating that despite all that many are still band 5s

@CovidCorvid

Sorry my post wasn’t very clear…..midwives are on band 6 after their initial preceptorship period whereas nurses stay on band 5 for ever unless they are promoted.

I didn’t realise this. I start midwifery this month and always assumed midwifes remained on band 5 so that’s a nice surprise to know.

[quote Effybriest]@CovidCorvid agree. In ICU we waited 9 years for a band 6 to come up. By that point nurses are extremely experienced in that speciality and wield a lot of autonomy. We are the eyes and ears of the doctors and our ability to spot things early/take action in deteriorating patients is essential. We use complex equipment like haemofilters and vents, administer potent meds like noradrenaline. Quite frustrating that despite all that many are still band 5s[/quote]
Yes it's crazy that a nurse with that level of responsibility isn't a band 6.