Creative Health and the Future of Nursing and Midwifery
NHS England is developing a new Professional Strategy for Nursing and Midwifery to shape the professions over the next 15 years (read more about the strategy here). With nurses and midwives at the heart of neighbourhood health, prevention, and patient care, this strategy sets out to ensure the workforce is ready for the challenges ahead – from digital transformation to widening health inequalities. As Duncan Burton, Deputy Chief Nursing Officer for England, has noted, the strategy will also look at how to better support colleagues throughout their careers and ensure nursing and midwifery remain modern careers of choice for more people.
The National Centre for Creative Health (NCCH) has submitted a formal response, highlighting the vital role that Creative Health can play in this future. We have shown how creative approaches not only support patients, but also sustain the workforce, build trust in services, and embed cultural competence into care.
Some of our stand-out contributions include:
- Evidence that Creative Health is an evidence-backed model of prevention
- Case studies showing how creativity can address inequalities in services and improve trust, from maternity care to community nursing.
- Examples of education reform in action.
- Recognition of nurses as cultural connectors, linking patients to community assets and strengthening neighbourhood health.
- Exploration of digital innovation that maintains and compliments the human touch of nursing.
- Workforce wellbeing and co-creation as opportunities for cultural change.
- Proposals for new career pathways and leadership roles in Creative Health, ensuring nurses and midwives can progress into advanced practice, consultancy, and research while shaping culture and wellbeing across the NHS.
Creative Health offers nurses and midwives new tools to connect, co-create, and care in ways that strengthen both professional culture and community health. NCCH’s commitment to this agenda continues through the forthcoming Creative Health in Nursing Special Interest Group (SIG), in collaboration with the Foundation of Nursing Studies (FoNS), which will give nurses a national platform to learn, design, and innovate together.
Read the full NCCH response here >>
Acknowledgements
This response was developed by our Research and Policy Officer, Jane Hearst, with support from Marion Lynch, a keen advocate for creative health in nursing.
