UHNM nurse receives CEO award for his influence on national guidelines

A lead nurse from University Hospitals of North Midlands has been awarded a CEO award for challenging basic life support (BLS) national guidelines.

Paul Broad, Lead Nurse for Adult Preceptorship, regularly checks for BLS updates to ensure the Nursing and Midwifery (NMC) Council Marking Criteria (2021) that is shared with OSCE (objective structured clinical examination) candidates, reflects current practice in line with the British Resuscitation Council guidance.

Paul, who is an OSCE facilitator, said: “During recent conversations with Spencer Henson, a UHNM Resuscitation Officer and my own mandatory BLS update, I noticed it stated under BLS guidance from the 2021 British Resuscitation Council guidelines that the carotid pulse check had been removed during the time of basic life support. It stated that this would be a skill expected of an Advanced Life Support (ALS) provider and not a BLS provider. Therefore, the NMC OSCE BLS marking criteria needed to change to reflect this.”

The NMC team responsible for the marking criteria reviewed their national guidelines and agreed with Paul that the criteria should be amended. The requirement to check for the carotid pulse has now been removed as part of the updated marking criteria for a BLS provider.

Tracy Bullock, UHNM Chief Executive said: “Paul has influenced national policy which is a really difficult thing for anyone to do. I am really pleased to present this award to Paul who was nominated by another clinician who thought Paul had done a brilliant job of ensuring national guidance was changed. Well done!”

Paul added: “I am really happy to receive this CEO award from Tracy. It is important to challenge subjects like this and as a result the guidelines were changed. This award is for the whole team, not just me, so thank you!”