Program Overview

Nurse Paramedic (Adult) MSci (Hons)

Overview

The Nurse Paramedic (Adult) MSci (Hons) program is a four-year integrated Masters degree that combines nursing and paramedic practice. The program is designed to equip students with the skills, knowledge, and experience necessary to become a versatile and dynamic practitioner with a focus on person-centered care.

Course Features

• Professional accreditation
• Professional practice placements
• Simulated learning

What You'll Study

The program is divided into four years, with each year building on the previous one to develop students' critical decision-making and ability to work independently.

Year 1

• Applying Evidence to Practice: Explores the impact of research on practice, introducing qualitative and quantitative research methodologies, professional enquiry, evidence-based practice, academic literacy, self-auditing, and interpreting data sets.
• Developing Professional Identity: Develops students' understanding of the integrated role of nurse paramedic, examining the role within a professional context to enable students to understand the complexities of this specific area of practice.
• Key Skills for Patient Care: Equips students with a range of essential patient care skills, including intermediate life support/heart-start, moving and handling, conflict resolution, patient assessment, observations, accurate record keeping, nutrition and hydration assessments, therapeutic communication skills, consent and capacity in the practice setting, and basic mental health awareness.
• Principles of Biological Science: Equips students with a theoretical knowledge base of the anatomy and physiology of the core systems within the human body, including the importance of biological sciences, the mechanics of pathogens and infection control, pharmacology, and clinical mathematics.
• Practice and Simulated Learning: Enables students to undertake safe, effective, and inclusive learning within suitable practice settings, providing experience of both nursing and paramedic practice.

Year 2

• Developing Critical Enquiry: Equips students with a deeper understanding of the research process and the methodologies associated with traditional and non-traditional research, examining published clinical guidelines and academic publications to add to the body of evidence for the role of the nurse paramedic.
• Foundations in Emergency Care: Enables students to develop skills-based care in emergency settings, consolidating scenario-based learning and translating this into practice.
• Pathophysiology and Person-Centred Care: Develops students' knowledge of the commonly encountered pathophysiological conditions within nurse paramedic practice, underpinned by an understanding of the effects of disease on the body.
• Practice and Simulated Learning: Enables students to undertake safe, effective, and inclusive learning within suitable practice settings, providing experience of mental healthcare, acute and emergency care, and critical care.
• Principles of Planning Care Across the Lifespan: Enables students to begin to contextualize care within different specialties and across the lifespan of the patient, examining growth and change through physical, cognitive, emotional, and social measures.

Year 3

• Essential Skills for Primary Care: Enables students to develop and demonstrate skills specific to a primary care setting, including the treatment of minor injuries, skin and wound care, triage, remote and digital care, screening and health promotion, as well as skills relating to behavioral change.
• Examining Service Improvement and Audit: Engages students with service improvement and audit to demonstrate their ability to initiate effective change within healthcare provision, enhancing their understanding of all aspects of a research proposal.
• Law and Ethics within Healthcare Practice: Explores the complexities of ethical dilemmas within healthcare practice, equipping students with the fundamental underpinning knowledge and understanding of how healthcare legal and ethical frameworks are applied in the process of safety netting and harm reduction.
• Practice and Simulated Learning: Enables students to undertake safe, effective, and inclusive learning within suitable practice settings, providing experience of supplementary care, patient assessment, and children and families.
• Social and Public Health: Contextualizes the principles of social and public health and how this influences the services that students will provide as nurse paramedics.

Year 4

• Clinical Diagnostics and Decision Making: Uses skills-based learning to develop students' awareness of investigation and diagnostic tools that are routinely deployed in nurse paramedic practice.
• Improving Quality through Research: Enhances healthcare provision and services through an in-depth exploration of quality improvement, quality assurance, and innovation, focusing on leading and transforming care.
• Leading Healthcare: Refines students' professional practice, leadership, and management skills, allowing them to demonstrate autonomy and critically appraise the relevance of leadership theories, frameworks, and styles to contemporary practice.
• Managing Chronic and Complex Care: Deconstructs strategies for the management of chronic disease and complex care patients, enabling students to engage with services that are available for the management of these patients and the person-centered approach to care.
• Practice and Simulated Learning: Enables students to undertake safe, effective, and inclusive learning within suitable practice settings across a range of negotiated and bespoke placements, culminating in a 12-week transition placement.

How You'll Study

• Years 1 and 4 are primarily delivered at Edge Hill University's Ormskirk campus, with some sessions at Alder Hey Institute in the Park.
• Years 2 and 3 are delivered at the St James' site in Manchester.
• Students will be taught through a combination of lectures, seminars, workshops, simulated practice, peer sessions, tutorials, and scenario-based learning.
• Placements will include weekends, early mornings, evenings, and night work to ensure a full range of practice experiences.

How You'll Be Assessed

• Assessments vary from Dragons' Den style presentations to written explorations of a condition or disease.
• Some assessments will be undertaken in practice settings, supported by qualified practitioners and academic staff.

Who Will Be Teaching You

• The program team comprises research-active professionals within the field of nursing and registered paramedics.
• Service users, carers, and their families will be involved in facilitating students' learning.

Entry Criteria

• Typical offer: 120-128 UCAS Tariff points, plus GCSE English Language and GCSE Mathematics at Grade C or Grade 4 or above (or equivalent).
• Relevant natural and applied science subjects are preferred but not essential.
• An interview forms part of the selection process.

How to Apply

• Apply online through UCAS.
• Read the guide to applying through UCAS to find out more about the application process.

Facilities

• The Faculty of Health, Social Care and Medicine offers outstanding facilities for the education and training of health and social care professionals.
• The contemporary teaching and learning resources include leading-edge clinical skills facilities, an 860-seat lecture theatre, and a variety of teaching rooms and social learning spaces.
• An additional clinical skills suite is available at St James' in Manchester, with teaching rooms, an open-plan library, and IT facilities.

Finance

• 2025/26 tuition fees: £9,535 per year (UK Full-Time).
• Students on this course may be entitled to the NHS Learner Support Fund if eligible.
• Please note that Student Finance's rules on previous study impacting eligibility for student funding do not currently apply to nurse paramedic students.

Your Future Career

• Completing this nurse paramedic degree gives students excellent career prospects with a Masters-level academic qualification and two professional awards.
• Many graduates go on to work in a variety of hospital and community settings or urgent and emergency care in the dynamic areas of nurse paramedic, nursing, and paramedicine.
• Students will be eligible to apply for registration as an adult nurse with the Nursing and Midwifery Council, while also qualifying as a paramedic with eligibility to apply for registration with the Health and Care Professions Council.