Leaving Nursing

[Kbop82]

Hi,
In Janaury I hit 20yrs in the NHS.
I am a registered Nurse in a band 6 post.
I recently deliberately took a full time WFH/Office based job.
As I am a single parent and my own parents although they have been amazing over the years. Are no longer able to help me with childcare as they were before. Basically it was too much.
It has been amazing I'm still learning the ropes, but I am able to provide the majority of my own childcare and do breakfast club drop offs myself. Which has massively improved all of my family's quality of life. My brother died 3yrs ago and I really cannot do clinical anymore. My DD is in Yr 5 at school and is pretty happy at the moment after a rough few years.

Anyway, I've just found out that I am going to be expected to be clinical again part time.
I am quite upset about this as the only real reason I haven't fully left nursing is because I am top band 6 and can't really afford a paycut, which I would have to take if I left this job and changed careers.
The reason I don't want to do clinical is because I have had health issues physical and mental health (following death of my brother). I thought I had been sensible taking this job. 😔
Yes I am reviewing my job description and requesting a meeting with my manager.
Advice please. What other roles could I do???

I'm so sorry op. This seems to be so common! I'm not NHS and not currently WFH but have heard a lot of storied from people who even took pay cuts to WFH and then had the goalposts moved after they started! They usually cover themselves with "we reserve the right to redeploy you per the business needs" in private sector.

Thankyou, xx

So I have spoken to my manager and whilst I haven't explained that I know my contract clearly states desk based job, as does my job description and that I know under the terms and conditions of my employment they are meant to give me 12wks written notice before changing to a clinical role. I have explained that I waited v patiently whilst working at an acute hospital for a desk based role to come up that fitted my skill set(just shy of four years) I have reiterated that I cannot use my parents for childcare anymore the way I did in the past, because they just cannot do it. (Which is absolutely fine and it was never my plan for them to be so hands on) as they finally have free time and their lives back.
Also out of the cohort of student nurses i trained with, there's only a handful of us left in nursing. The majority have v happily moved on because the stress and impact on their personal/ family lives and health wasn't worth it.
I would definitely like advice about moving on. I need to earn approx 35k a year to keep afloat etc. I am trying to write a book, which feels a bit like a fantasy way out of my situation, but it is therapeutic.
Seriously help appreciated xx

Also out of the cohort of student nurses i trained with, there's only a handful of us left in nursing. The majority have v happily moved on

What are they doing now? Can you do the same if you now also want to leave nursing?

How about safeguarding? CQC? Education and training roles? Infection control? Can you do
one of the project management/ leadership courses and go into project management?

Can you do an office based nursing role? My friend had recently left her clinical role and is mostly working from home. She takes referrals from GPS for specific consultants/surgeons etc and then puts them in priority order on the waiting list basically. This is a band 6 role so they are out there. She is loving the flexibility this gives her childcare wise.

Have you searched LinkedIn etc putting in your skills, qualifications and preferences?

Theres loads of jobs in industry.

Hi this is meant to be an office role, xx but they have moved the goalposts xx

Can you do an office role without a clinical aspect ?
Eg safeguarding or phone training for DNs ?

Hi thankyou for the advice and information, I have been doing a lot more research into a career change than I have in the past.
I am leaning towards secondary school teaching - science. I am going to look into spending some time volunteering/ shadowing during a week's annual leave during the next school year. With the aim to start my year's initial training when my DD starts year 7 Sept 2025. Obviously there's a lot I need to organise beforehand and it's not ideal changing careers in my 40s, plus DD will just be starting a new school. But I feel as though I have been hanging on by my fingernails to my nursing since I went on mat leave in early 2014. Which is ridiculous! Xx but advice on #teachertraining #secondaryschool etc would be fab xx

How about the DWP assessor roles? Unless this is what you’re already doing. I’ve heard really mixed reviews thoigh. Things about the targets being difficult to meet etc x I hope the shadowing teachers works for you x x

Yes, I've not heard anything good about this role. Everyone I've worked with who's left to do this role doesn't last long. I'm in a similar boat op, qualified 20 years next year, band 7. Don't know what else I could do. I definitely don't want to do a dwp/111 role. I was looking at an NVQ assessor role at one point.

yup I’ve heard very inhuman.

im an AHP and I work for social services. The pay scale where I am is slightly higher than NHs. There are some nurses in local authorities doing case management, and some roles are open to any qualified with HCPC or NMC - is that worth looking into? I find caseloads sometimes a bit overwhelming but a lot of autonomy to work where and how you want. Might be worth a look at? X

Isn’t secondary teaching just out of the frying pan into the fire? Give me a part office part clinical nursing role any day.

What about working for a health insurance company? The company I work for employs clinical staff, things like nurse case managers. Or an occupational health company that needs clinical staff to manage cases?

Look for teaching jobs at universities, the NMC, HCPC, civil service jobs and the CQC. Your skills will be in demand and readily transferable.
I'm a trained midwife, 10+ years out of practice now, and worked for NMC and now in the civil service.
I earn above what your aiming for.

I’m sorry, but I really can’t see that if you have physical and mental health issues, can’t afford to take a pay cut from top of band 6 NHS, and are mostly working from home and don’t want to go back into a clinical role, how moving to secondary teaching is going to help at all! The workload in teaching is insane, particularly the first few years where you are learning the ropes and having to formulate all your lesson plans et cetera for the first time. As many people are leaving teaching as are leaving healthcare rules in the NHS. Certainly there will be no remote working, you will be expected to be in front of classes of teenagers every day. I’m all in favour of changing roles if you are unhappy in the current one, but I do think that something slightly related to what you are doing now would be a better option.

I'd also question whether secondary teaching is a good fit for you given what you've said. It's brutal.

If you want to teach, why not give it a go. Nursing roles are often 12 hour shifts including nights, school holidays and other times that childcare is not available so it may suit you better. I think the reason to choose it is if you really want to teach though.

My neice became a PIP assessor.. working from home via Zoom.. ex band 6 Mental health nurse

If you have mental and physical health needs, personally I would try to go down an occupational health route in your current role first. Its not going to be easy to get into another career with your requirements and the salary you want at 42k.

I would echo what PP have said about whether nursing to teaching would just be out of the frying pan and into the fire. It wouldn't meet your salary requirements immediately and will be physically and mentally demanding. Combining your PGCE year with your DD going into Y7 sounds like setting yourself up to fail.

I went from band 6 nursing to education professional services. I considered teaching too, but realised it would be just as demanding. Although nurse lecturer might work for you?

I really feel for you, this is so hard and I hope you find a solution soon. I left direct care nursing to teach nursing and I worked as an academic link supporting student in practice (not clinical) and found that most of the mentor/supervisor support "office" roles were pulled back into practice frequently when crisis hit (that was band 6/7s). Being in education (teaching clinical skills at the University) meant I could choose whether to do bank shifts or not. I was lucky to find a place that supported my ongoing education to do this.

If anyone in this thread is interested, I'm aware of a study that's recruiting for early career nurses who have left within 5 years of qualifying - it's about "telling your story" which will help to raise awareness of why people might leave nursing with the aim of getting our voices heard. Here is the link
https://x.com/FionaBastow/status/1755177848875172239?s=20

What about an adjacent role? There are lots of nurses employed in the ambulance service, working on the frontline, call centres but also in office based roles? Depends if there is a base near you.