Placements: Frequently asked questions

Yes, you must show your NHS ID to access this service. You will need to get an NHS ID card from the HR department of Gloucester Hospitals Trust. You are likely to need an appointment to do this.

You should be able to contact the HR department by calling the trust switchboard – 0300 422 2222 and asking for the HR department. There is also a subsidised park & ride scheme available with this service.

Unfortunately, we will not be able to swap placements. The process of allocating placements is very complex and takes into consideration a whole range of factors, including staffing at the placements, student location, placement capacity, NMC requirements among other factors.

There are many places where you can access help and advice, including:

– The placements team: [email protected]
– Student Centre: [email protected]
– your coach in practice (Nursing students) [email protected]
– the welfare team – [email protected]
– your personal tutor & your course lead.

If you are unsure who to ask for help, then please contact the placements team, and we will direct you to the most appropriate place.

Where possible, students are notified of the details of their placement allocation within four weeks of the placement start date, but this cannot always be guaranteed. We will always release placements early if we are able, as we recognise that this helps with planning for travel & childcare.

No on-site parking is available at Cheltenham General or Gloucester Royal Hospital. There is some limited on-street parking, and a number of town centre car parks are available.

If you are eligible for LSF funding, you may be able to claim back parking costs; please email [email protected] for more information.

Yes, you need to send a picture of the damaged uniform along with the sizing of the uniform required to [email protected]. Please ensure that you include your student number and course in the email.

Yes, you can purchase uniform from our online shop.

If the uniform you wish to purchase isn’t displayed please email [email protected] with the uniform you want to purchase, you will then be given details of how to buy uniform direct from the supplier at the university rate.

Please ensure that you include your student number and course in the email.

If your uniform no longer fits please contact [email protected] and they will be able to assist you in purchasing new uniform. Please ensure that you include your student number and course in the email.

Please email [email protected] with your student number and course and a replacement badge can be ordered.

If the uniform is unworn and still with the original tags and packaging, yes. Please email [email protected] Please ensure that you include your student number, course, the current size of your uniform and the size you wish to swap it to in the email.

You are able to download this direct from your LSF account. Unfortunately, the university doesn’t have access to this form. If you are struggling to download the correct form, please contact the LSF directly.

The millage rate set by the LSF is currently 0.28p per mile.

Please send the scanned form along with any receipts in PDF format to [email protected] the form then be checked through and sent to the LSF. You will receive an email once this has been done. If there are any changes to be made on the form you will be contacted.

Claims will be processed within 25 working days from the date of receipt and payments will then be made within 10 working days.

Please allow these timescales to lapse before contacting the Learning Support Fund. We do advise that students check their accounts regularly for any updates regarding claims. 

If a payment has not been added to your account within 25 working days, we ask that you contact the Leaning Support Fund using the relevant links below:   

NHS LSF queries: Contact us | NHSBSA 

NHS Bursary queries: Students – Contact us | NHSBSA

If you need further help to fill in the form, please contact [email protected] with your student number and course and help can be arranged.

If you require support with any aspect of ARC, please email: [email protected]

We welcome feedback on all aspects of our implementation of ARC – please send your feedback and comments to: [email protected]

If you would like to book training for the ePAD, please click here to go to the ePAD training booking page. For all other training needs, please email [email protected]

Yes, we have a dedicated YouTube Channel with video guides on all aspects of ARC. View dedicated YouTube channel. Alternatively, there is a full list of Student ePAD guides here and a full list of staff ePAD guides here

An HCA is a valuable member of the nursing team and can provide a range of learning opportunities in delivering core nursing skills to student nurses.

One option is to ask the student why they are feeling like this and explore thoughts, feelings, experiences, and expectations with the student nurse.

Ensuring that the learning is aligned to the practice-based module learning outcomes they are undertaking.

There is a range of support available to students to access. This can be from a Student Centre, personal tutors, CIPs, money advice Health and wellbeing pages on My Glos, PEFs or equivalent.

Any disabilities and additional learning needs will need to be discussed with the Placement Lead for an Occupational Health assessment. An access plan may be put into place following the OH report. An Access plan is a guide to help you to support your student in practice and to be aware of any additional learning needs they may have. The student is responsible for the Access Plan and sharing of this information.

tudents are advised through the Placement Agreement, that whilst they can discuss their shift preferences with you, there is no requirement for placements to offer set days. All placement areas are supported by the Practice Support Team who would be able to help guide you in this situation. The Practice support team can be emailed via [email protected]

Placement capacity is provided to us by trust education leads. If you feel that your ward or area has been allocated too many students, please contact your trust education team in the first instance.

Explore the issues around the difficulties the student is facing – are they related to the placement? Does the assessment need to be undertaken at that time, or could it be planned for a later date? Contact the CIP or University for further support for the student.

The first point is to contact the student whos details will be available on ARC, or continue to contact Practice Support, who will be able to raise this with the Academic Course Lead.

If you have concerns about your student, please contact the Practice Support team for further advice and support.

A Coach in Practice or CIP provides support for students whilst in placement, advice, and guidance for Practice Assessors. CIPs are not involved in the signing off of practice documents in place of a Practice Assessor. They do not allocate placements; this is done by the placement team’s Quality & Allocation Managers.

If you are a Practice Assessor and need an account in the ePAD, please email [email protected] with your name, contact number and placement location, and we will create an account for you.

Yes, the student will be able to read all comments that you save as part of their midpoint/endpoint in their view. They will also be able to see any passes or fails you have entered in the professional values section.

Practice Supervisors can sign the Orientation, Initial Interview & Assessment of Proficiencies.

Practice Assessors can sign the Orientation, Initial Interview, Mid-point Interview, Final Interview, OAR, Assessment of Proficiencies, Episodes of Care & Medicines Management.

This only needs to be completed at the end of the academic year; this will be after placement 2 in Part 1, after placement 4 in Part 2 and after the final placement in Part 3.

Yes, you can revoke ePad and keep all information safe; you just need to save and submit again. If you are unsure, please ask for help by emailing [email protected]

Your Practice Assessor must complete the Episodes of Care and Medicines Management – your Practice Supervisor is not permitted to do this.

Please discuss this with your course lead or the module lead for the placements module, as this does vary with each part. For Part 1 students, a formative EoC should be completed in placement 1 and a Summative EoC in Placement 2.

You should complete all proficiencies that are available in your placement, but you must complete a minimum of 50% of the proficiencies by the end of the first placement.

If you have attempted a proficiency but not passed it, it will be marked with a red cross and that proficiency will still need to be passed before the end of the part.

You must complete all proficiencies by the end of the part.

You must be able to demonstrate that you have maintained the proficiencies in the 2nd placement of each part but they do not need to be resigned if your assessor is happy that you have maintained your competency in every available proficiency.

If your assessor feels that you have not maintained your competency in any of the proficiencies, they will mark that proficiency with a cross and you will need to have it signed off again as a pass before the end of the placement.

Proficiencies should only be left blank if there is no opportunity for you to undertake them in your placement. If the opportunity is there you should have the proficiency assessed. All proficiencies must be passed by the end of the part (Year).

If you need a Practice Assessor added to the ePAD, please fill in the form in the Students Access section of the practice support site.

No, practice supervisors cannot be added to the ePAD as they are not permitted, under the NMC Standards for Education, to complete several sections of the ePAD.

If you need a practice supervisor to have access for example to complete your initial interview or add a proficiency, you can invite them yourself. Please refer to the Student ePAD Help Guides if you need help with this.

There are some proficiencies that can be completed either in Part 2 or Part 3, these are marked with ** – there are 12 proficiencies from Part 2 that can be completed in Part 3, and 2 proficiencies from Part 3 that can be completed in Part 2.

If you choose to leave some of the ** Part 2 proficiencies until you are in Part 3, you will still need to complete a minimum of 50% (17 proficiencies) in the first placement of Part 2. Our advice is to only leave a proficiency until Part 3 if there is no opportunity for you to undertake it in Part 2. Leaving too many Part 2 proficiencies until Part 3 will create more work for you in Part 3.

Please also remember that you must complete all proficiencies, including the ** proficiencies, by the end of the course, and if you complete a Part 3 proficiency in Part 2, you still need to show that you have maintained your competency in that area throughout Part 3.

Yes, you can revoke it without losing information if you resubmit it and have it reapproved. You will not lose information if this is revoked.

No, mentors do not require a password or login to access the timesheet, they only need to click on the link that is automatically emailed to them.

Please check that the email is not in your spam folder and then ask the student to check that they have used the correct email address. The student can change the email address and resend the request to approve their timesheet. If this does not work, please email [email protected]

This is correct for a 7 ½ hour shift. Similarly, 7 ¼ hours would be recorded as 7.15 and 7 ¾ hours would be recorded as 7.45. In this case, you can approve the timesheet.

Yes, breaks need to be correctly identified in the timesheets.

Yes – you must still add the day, but tick the box to indicate that you were absent from placement that day.

Once they have been approved, timesheets need to be processed by ARC before the hours will show for you. This can take up to 72 hours, although it is normally much quicker. If your timesheets do not look correct after 72 hours, please email [email protected]

ARC will send you a link to evaluate your placement.

Click on ‘Click here to evaluate your placement’ on the menu bar. Note: ARC will not let you view or interact with your next placement until after this is complete.

You need to complete your timesheet at the end of each week. Placements may refuse to sign timesheets that have not been submitted weekly, and those hours will not then count towards your total practice hours.

In the first instance, please ask your supervisor or ward/placement manager to complete the timesheets. If you are not able to get them completed, please discuss this with your coach in practice. They can be reached on [email protected]

Yes, breaks need to be correctly entered into your timesheets.

Yes – timesheets must be completed through ARC POW unless you have travelled abroad for your elective placement. If you have paper-based timesheets because you have had a foreign elective placement, please email them as soon as possible to [email protected]

Yes, you need to use the ePAD unless you have travelled abroad. Paper-based elective documentation for foreign placements only is available here. You should not complete an Episode of Care as these must be completed in placements 3 & 4. Any proficiencies or meds management completed will need to be maintained throughout the rest of the part and can be revoked if not maintained.

Yes – you must complete all interview sections of the ePAD.

Yes – you must complete a reflection for each shift which you need to submit to your tutor and keep to show to the NMC upon registration if requested. Please do not email your reflections to the placement team.

Yes, you are required to work night shifts in all placements. You need to work two night shifts in each placement. If your placement does not work night shifts, you do not need to make them up on another placement.

Unfortunately no. You are required to work the off-duty that is assigned to you by the ward or placement area. You are very welcome to discuss your personal situation with the placement, and in most cases, they will do their best to accommodate you, but the availability of staff and other operational considerations may mean that they are not able to accommodate specific shift requests.

Yes, you are expected to work weekend shifts if they are available in your placement. If there are no weekend shifts, if, for example, you are in a GP Practice, you are not required to make them up at another time. You should expect to work approximately 1 in 4 weekends, although some placement areas e.g. DCC will work more due to their shift patterns.

Unfortunately, no, you are required by the NMC to work a range of shifts in each placement. This will include early and late shifts as well as nights and weekends.

Yes, you must write a reflection for every shift worked.

You must not include any time spent writing reflections in your placement hours, as this would result in the hours being counted twice. You can complete the reflection on the placement if you wish to, but this must be after you have completed the full shift. You cannot be released from shift early to complete your reflections.

No, you only need to write reflections for shifts actually worked. You will not receive any placement time for reflections written when you are absent from placement.

You will need to submit all reflections to your course team. The placements team do not mark or review any reflections.

Yes – the NMC may ask you to provide evidence of your placement hours when you apply for your PIN. In this situation, we will provide you with a placement transcript which shows the hours worked in practice and university simulation time, but you will need to submit your reflections in addition as evidence of those hours.

Please discuss this with your Practice Assessor in the first instance, as guidance does vary between placements. In general, any spoke days should follow these principles:

1. You should only look to arrange a spoke day within the same Trust & Site.
2. The spoke must be directly relevant to the placement.
3. Speak to placement about how to arrange spoke opportunities – some of our areas have timetables or a list of areas and are happy for students to arrange.
4. If you are not currently on track to pass the placement, you should not be arranging spoke days unless this is in order to fulfil or achieve a missing proficiency/medication management etc.

Yes, that’s right. You must only count PLT on ePAD (for the NMC requirements) on your base placement because we have already accounted for your away placement hours. However, PLT, away placement and uni days all count as OTJ hours for Aptem (apprenticeship).

You can log the whole shift as one episode of PLT. Then, consider getting feedback/doing a reflection on one thing you did during the day.

Your cross-field experience and inter-professional working sections of the ePAD are available to you during all your placements across the year, so you should be putting reflections on learning there. And don’t forget the initial, mid-point and final interviews and OAR for each away placement as well.

Yes, but not away placement interviews as we have already accounted for these – PLT is strictly to protect your learning time on base placement. Your entire away placement is already protected as learning time because you’re supernumerary.

No. Your OAR should be completed at the end of the placement, and you won’t have completed your base placement yet. Your base OAR must be completed at the end of the base placement.

Some cohorts may be given specific deadlines, but as a guide, you should do them around half-way through your away placement. If you are completing them too close to the beginning or the end, you won’t be able to demonstrate that you made any progress through your placement.

All this information is in the ePAD Assessment Guide on Moodle.

Please upload these to the record of communications but remember to use a sensible file name and description.

As long as everything that needs to be signed off is signed off on your ePAD, we will check that and put the grade onto Moodle. You don’t need to submit anything direct to Moodle yourself for your ePAD.

No, changing a placement is not possible once the allocations have been made. View criteria for a change of placement. If there are extenuating circumstances that you think need to be considered, please email [email protected] as soon as possible, and we can look into it for you.

To avoid the need to change placements, please make sure your ARC profile is up to date at all times, including addresses, conflicts of interest, and driver status.

As a University, we have our established Practice Partners that provide us with placements each year, we have formal agreements with these partners and capacity is managed carefully. When sourcing/suggesting own placement, this will be dependent on capacity and whether it fits any gaps in the breadth of experience needed to register.

Setting up a new placement can be a long process, and we cannot usually do this on an individual basis. However, we are open to establishing new relationships with potential practice partners if deemed suitable. Please contact [email protected].

The important total hours to look at is the Worked Hours or Completed Hours, as long as you are happy that these are correct, then it does not matter if there is a slight discrepancy with allocated hours.

Please wait at least 48 hours for the hours to upload once your practice educator has approved your timesheet. This is usually the reason why the hours do not look right.

No, this is not the case. There are various reasons why a placement might require a car driver, and it does not mean that you will necessarily be placed further away. If you don’t indicate you have a car, you may be reducing the variety of placement opportunities available, and you will still be expected to travel to more distant placements using public transport. Please read the Placement Agreement for important information on travelling to and from placement.

Please make sure you have completed the evaluation for your previous placement. This is usually the reason you cannot see your most recent placement allocation.

Currently, smartcards cannot be used in private placements or Gloucestershire Hospitals Trust. You can use your smartcard in Gloucestershire Health & Care, AWP and most GP placements.

If you have lost your smart card, you need to contact the smart card issuer. For Gloucestershire Health & Care, this is the Clinical Systems Help Desk [email protected] or 0300 421 8122 or you can contact the lead RA Agent – Colin Douglas on [email protected]

If you have not had a card before, please complete this form to apply for a smart card.

Please discuss this with the local smartcard administrator on your ward – UOG cannot reset smartcard PINs.

All students who have, or are expecting to have, a placement within Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Trust will need to apply for an IT account to be able to access their system. Please use this link to put in your application. Please note that this IT Account will only be used with Gloucestershire Hospitals NHS Trust.