Nursing and Midwifery
Mainstreaming Genomics in Nursing and Midwifery
Rapid advances in the field of genomics are affecting the delivery of healthcare. This is why genomics is fundamental to the practice of all nurses and midwives, regardless of specialty, and is included in the NMC standards of proficiency for registered nurses and midwives.
Embedding genomics into every-day care will enable the NHS to deliver better outcomes for patients including faster and more accurate diagnoses, personalised treatments, prevention, and early detection. Nurses and midwives play a vital role in embedding genomics into routine care and will continue to do so in the future.
How will this project make a difference?
The North Thames GMS are working to support nurses and midwives in our region to enable them to deliver quality assured genomic services.
We are doing this through:
- Education and training: supporting nurses and midwives to develop their knowledge and skills in genomics pre and post registration. This includes supporting the integration of genomics into the nursing and midwifery curriculum and targeted educational events for individual specialties.
- Leadership: empowering nurses and midwives to build their confidence and capability to lead, deliver and co-ordinate genomic practice in everyday care and to ensure a multidisciplinary and sustainable approach is taken.
- Developing and improving care pathways to increase equity of access to genomic services and reduce unwarranted variation
- Supporting the implementation of national and local transformation projects ensuring the mainstreaming of genomics in nursing and midwifery activity.
Impact of the project so far
A pilot project in two community paediatric services where Clinical Nurse Specialists were upskilled with genomics competencies to embed Whole Genome Sequencing (WGS) testing pathways into community paediatric services. This enabled more equitable access to WGS testing that supported the needs of the patients and families.
The National Lynch Syndrome (LS) project aimed to improve the identification and management of people with LS, bridging the gap in testing and diagnosis and supporting the early detection of cancer and access to personalised care.
Significant quality improvement has been implemented, facilitating systematic delivery of universal testing for LS nationally with a reduction in variation in care.
National GMSA Transformation Project: Lynch Syndrome (norththamesgenomics.nhs.uk)
bsg.org.uk/clinical-resource/(sss)-english-lynch-syndrome-project
Tracey Cole, a Registered Nurse and Darzi Clinical Fellow worked on the Genomic Pathology Accelerator Programme with Pathology services. The aim was to analyse and improve the ways in which tumour samples for solid cancers were processed and used for diagnosis to optimise turnaround times and ensure a high-quality process across the NHS Genomic Medicine Service.
As the largest workforce within the NHS, nurses and midwives are essential in putting the continuing genomic advances into practice. Genomics has been included in the nursing and midwifery standards of proficiency since 2018, and there are many nurses and midwife specialists working in genomics. However, overall genomics literacy across the nurses and midwife workforce remains low.
Nurses and midwives must be aware of how genomics is relevant to their current and future practice and upskill as required. This will support equitable access to genomic healthcare and the NHS achieving its Genomic strategy and long-term plans.
To ready the workforce to deliver genomic healthcare the NT GMSA collaborates on national and local projects that supports nurses and midwives’ genomic practice, educational and training needs. This includes supporting the embedment of genomics within pre-registration nursing and midwifery education programmes.
We value a collaborative approach to embedding genomics into nursing and midwifery practice, linking in with other regional and national teams to share best practice.
A ‘Nursing and Midwifery Genomic Ambassador Programme’ has been established, in collaboration with the South East Genomic Medicine Service to act as a key link between the NHS Trusts and the GMSA Nursing and Midwifery team.
Leading on from a collaboration with the South East Genomic Medicine Service, we have set up a National “Lunch and Learn” series of webinars for nurses and midwives to gain an insight into how genomic testing is used across different areas of healthcare
Together with our clinical scientists, we are exploring how we can optimise testing and ensure there is equitable access to genomic testing for people who experience recurrent miscarriage.
Presentation: Patient experiencing recurrent miscarriage — In the Clinic (hee.nhs.uk)
We are working with patient and public involvement and engagement (PPIE) and third sector organisations in work-streams across the NT GMSA. Together with our research partners such as Genomics England, we are striving to ensure that genomic testing and genomic research is accessible to all.
Education and training
We offer national and local education and training sessions which will be advertised on our events calendar. Please subscribe to our events calendar to get up to date event notifications.
We offer bespoke training sessions which include webinars, face-to-face teaching, podcasts, engagement days and conferences. Contact us to discuss your educational and training needs nt-gmsa@gosh.nhs.uk
Genomics is applicable to all nurses and midwives, whether in training, newly registered or an advanced practitioner. We offer a range of resources that are available on our education and training pages.