STUDY

Postgraduate

MSc Adult Nursing (Pre-registration)

Nurses fob watch
Institution code: S82
UCAS code: N/A
Start date: January 2025
Duration: Full-time two years
Location: Ipswich
Typical Offer: Please see entry requirements
Institution code: S82
UCAS code: N/A
Start date: January 2025
Duration: Full-time two years
Location: Ipswich
Typical Offer: Please see entry requirements
Course information table
Institution code: S82
UCAS code: N/A
Start date: January 2026
Duration: Full-time two years
Location: Ipswich
Typical Offer: Please see entry requirements
Course information table
Institution code: S82
UCAS code: N/A
Start date: January 2026
Course information table
Duration: Full-time two years
Location: Ipswich
Typical Offer: Please see entry requirements

Closed to International applications for January 2025, please see next intake

Overview

This accelerated course aims to prepare existing graduates for an exciting and rewarding career as a Registered Nurse (Adult). You will undertake a range of theory modules across the 2-year program, complemented by clinical practice placements to allow you to develop the skills, knowledge, and experience required by nurses delivering healthcare across a wide range of clinical settings.

During your course, you will gain a wide range of clinical experience during placements with our practice providers, which offers you the opportunity to engage with potential future employers throughout your course, helping you make a seamless transition to your first role as a qualified nurse. Placements will be arranged by the University in conjunction with our practice placement providers.

While on placement, you will work with allocated practice assessors and supervisors, who will support your development in the clinical environment. Your practice placements will typically include opportunities to gain experience in nursing within Acute wards in NHS Trust hospitals, Community nursing, Specialist care areas, and Outpatient departments within the voluntary and private sector healthcare.

During your placements, you will be working 37.5 hours per week and will experience care delivery across the 24-hour spectrum. Thus, you will be expected to work both day and night shifts, and your placement time will include weekend working to ensure maximum opportunity to work alongside your practice assessors and supervisors. By the end of the course, you will need to have completed a minimum of 2300 hours of clinical practice across a range of clinical placement settings and 2300 theory hours to be considered for registration with the Nursing and Midwifery Council.

NMC Registered nurses from mental health, learning disability, or children's nursing who are applying to undertake the MSc Adult Nursing course to achieve registration in a different field of nursing can apply for recognition of prior learning that is capable of being mapped to the Standards of proficiency for registered nurses and the university course outcomes to a maximum of 80 credits.

 

The University of Suffolk is world-class and committed to our region. We are proudly modern and innovative and we believe in transformative education. We are on the rise with a focus on student satisfaction, graduate prospects, spending on academic services and student facilities.

5th

in the UK for graduates in career 15 months after graduation for health professions

(Guardian University Guide 2023)

3rd

for Postgraduate Study

(WhatUni Student Choice Awards 2023)

2nd

in the East of England for graduate prospects

(Complete University Guide 2024)

Course Modules

The course is delivered at the University of Suffolk Ipswich campus. Studying full-time on MSc Adult Nursing (Pre-registration), you are likely to have approximately 640 contact hours. The contact hours will be a mix of lectures, seminars, tutorials, workshops, and skills-based practical workshops. You will also be required to engage with guided study activities through the online learning platform Brightspace and other mandatory e-learning across various platforms. Due to the accelerated nature of the course, students will be expected to complete 43 hours of study per week (inclusive of: direct contact hours, preparing for contact sessions, online activity, assessment preparation, and independent study), to meet the required 2300 theory hours.

Downloadable information regarding all University of Suffolk courses, including Key Facts, Course Aims, Course Structure and Assessment, is available in the Definitive Course Records

Surgical lamp

The landscape of health and social care is constantly changing and evolving, in response to different political, economic and social pressures within society. Within this module, you will be introduced to the role of the nurse within contemporary healthcare, to develop knowledge and understanding of concepts such as evidence-based practice and person-centred care and the core values expected of the nurse. During the module, you will be encouraged to engage in personal and professional development activities, to consider aspects such as self-awareness, resilience, communication skills and team-working.

The nature of contemporary nursing practice requires strong foundations in the applied biological sciences. In this module, health and human development is explored in terms of physiological processes, to consider health, illness and disease from a cellular level to a whole systems approach, to enable you to recognise physiological deviations, which can be seen in disease and illness. These disciplines are fundamental to your ability to make informed, reasoned assessments of an individual's needs in health and illness.

This module builds on the knowledge and learning from the earlier Health and Human Development 1 module, to consider major pathological and physiological changes which may occur as a result of common diseases and disease processes. You will explore the determinants of health, their impact on health at a physiological level and the potential impacts and interventions required to support the adult experiencing ill-health. You will be introduced to the principles of pharmacology and consider current pharmacological approaches to the management of disease and ill-health, alongside other elements such as co-morbidity and the role of the multi-professional team in the management and treatment of disease/ill-health.

Early recognition of the deteriorating patient is a key element in managing, stabilising, and treating such patients, to prevent further deterioration and harm. In contemporary healthcare, nurses must be able to recognise the critically ill or deteriorating patient, make a rapid evidence-based assessment, initiate supportive management and/or seek support from the multi-professional healthcare team. Applying a ‘whole systems approach’ means that adult nurses must be able to consider the mental health well-being of their patients as well as their physical well-being.

Health and social care services are facing unprecedented demands from an ageing population who are living longer with significant long-term, and complex healthcare needs, often complicated by co-morbidities. All health and social care providers must have greater understanding of methods to meet the holistic needs of service users who are living with complex, long term health conditions, in a resource-limited health landscape. Medicines optimisation is also considered within this module, as service users living with complex conditions often experience medication-related issues such as polypharmacy, multi-morbidity and complex drug regimes, which can all contribute to patient safety concerns or lack of concordance.

Adult Nurses are increasingly expected to lead and manage care and take on autonomous and advanced practice roles in a range of settings. This module will consolidate and build upon previous learning and will introduce you to new concepts, to strengthen your ability to lead and support a team, to build your resilience and give you the skills to drive service innovation. This module will provide the opportunity to develop knowledge and to demonstrate sophisticated application of an appropriate evidence base.

This module will build on your prior undergraduate knowledge of research methods and methodology, to undertake an evidence-based literature review, or service enquiry, to understand the role of current research and its application to contemporary nursing practice.

The NMC (2018) Standards for pre-registration nursing requires that students learn and are assessed in practice environments. This module focuses on developing competence in the areas of practice covered in the practice assessment document. Professional values are viewed as an important aspect of working in practice environments and are therefore, assessed through this module.

The course is delivered at the University of Suffolk Ipswich campus. Studying full-time on MSc Adult Nursing (Pre-registration), you are likely to have approximately 640 contact hours. The contact hours will be a mix of lectures, seminars, tutorials, workshops, and skills-based practical workshops. You will also be required to engage with guided study activities through the online learning platform Brightspace and other mandatory e-learning across various platforms. Due to the accelerated nature of the course, students will be expected to complete 43 hours of study per week (inclusive of: direct contact hours, preparing for contact sessions, online activity, assessment preparation, and independent study), to meet the required 2300 theory hours.

Downloadable information regarding all University of Suffolk courses, including Key Facts, Course Aims, Course Structure and Assessment, is available in the Definitive Course Records

Surgical lamp

The landscape of health and social care is constantly changing and evolving, in response to different political, economic and social pressures within society. Within this module, you will be introduced to the role of the nurse within contemporary healthcare, to develop knowledge and understanding of concepts such as evidence-based practice and person-centred care and the core values expected of the nurse. During the module, you will be encouraged to engage in personal and professional development activities, to consider aspects such as self-awareness, resilience, communication skills and team-working.

The nature of contemporary nursing practice requires strong foundations in the applied biological sciences. In this module, health and human development is explored in terms of physiological processes, to consider health, illness and disease from a cellular level to a whole systems approach, to enable you to recognise physiological deviations, which can be seen in disease and illness. These disciplines are fundamental to your ability to make informed, reasoned assessments of an individual's needs in health and illness.

This module builds on the knowledge and learning from the earlier Health and Human Development 1 module, to consider major pathological and physiological changes which may occur as a result of common diseases and disease processes. You will explore the determinants of health, their impact on health at a physiological level and the potential impacts and interventions required to support the adult experiencing ill-health. You will be introduced to the principles of pharmacology and consider current pharmacological approaches to the management of disease and ill-health, alongside other elements such as co-morbidity and the role of the multi-professional team in the management and treatment of disease/ill-health.

Early recognition of the deteriorating patient is a key element in managing, stabilising, and treating such patients, to prevent further deterioration and harm. In contemporary healthcare, nurses must be able to recognise the critically ill or deteriorating patient, make a rapid evidence-based assessment, initiate supportive management and/or seek support from the multi-professional healthcare team. Applying a ‘whole systems approach’ means that adult nurses must be able to consider the mental health well-being of their patients as well as their physical well-being.

Health and social care services are facing unprecedented demands from an ageing population who are living longer with significant long-term, and complex healthcare needs, often complicated by co-morbidities. All health and social care providers must have greater understanding of methods to meet the holistic needs of service users who are living with complex, long term health conditions, in a resource-limited health landscape. Medicines optimisation is also considered within this module, as service users living with complex conditions often experience medication-related issues such as polypharmacy, multi-morbidity and complex drug regimes, which can all contribute to patient safety concerns or lack of concordance.

Adult Nurses are increasingly expected to lead and manage care and take on autonomous and advanced practice roles in a range of settings. This module will consolidate and build upon previous learning and will introduce you to new concepts, to strengthen your ability to lead and support a team, to build your resilience and give you the skills to drive service innovation. This module will provide the opportunity to develop knowledge and to demonstrate sophisticated application of an appropriate evidence base.

This module will build on your prior undergraduate knowledge of research methods and methodology, to undertake an evidence-based literature review, or service enquiry, to understand the role of current research and its application to contemporary nursing practice.

The NMC (2018) Standards for pre-registration nursing requires that students learn and are assessed in practice environments. This module focuses on developing competence in the areas of practice covered in the practice assessment document. Professional values are viewed as an important aspect of working in practice environments and are therefore, assessed through this module.

Waterfront Building reflecting in the marina

WHY SUFFOLK

2nd in the UK for Career Prospects

WUSCA 2024

3rd in the UK for spend on academic services

Complete University Guide 2025

4th in the UK for Teaching Satisfaction

Guardian University Guide 2024
Close-up of nursing student using manual resuscitator bag
Nursing student
Students at a bedside in a stimulation ward
Adult nursing student, Jamie
Students and lecturer using a manual resuscitator bag
Nursing lecturer and students
Students at a bedside in a stimulation ward
Health and Wellbeing building facilities

Entry Requirements

Entry Requirements

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Career Opportunities

On successful completion of the course, you will be eligible to apply for registration with the Nursing and Midwifery Council. This provides you with an internationally recognised professional qualification, and offers many different employment opportunities. On registration, local employment opportunities within Suffolk are excellent; or you might prefer to seek out national opportunities across the United Kingdom, or even consider international employment opportunities abroad.

There are many different career avenues for Adult Nurses to consider, such as:

  • Acute hospital Trusts, community nursing

  • Hospice nursing

  • Nursing in the private sector

  • A career in research or a career in higher education

 

Graduation is merely the first stepping stone to a rewarding and fulfilling career within nursing.

Your Course Team

Fees and Funding

UK Full-time Tuition Fee

£9,870

per year
International Full-time Tuition Fee

£18,470

inclusive of placement fee

Fees and Funding

UK Full-time Tuition Fee

£10,215

per year
UK Part-time Tuition Fee

£1,135*

per 20 credit module
International Full-time Tuition Fee

£18,470

per year, includes placement fee

*Please contact Student Centre for further information on part-time fees

How to apply

Applying for a postgraduate programme is simple, you can apply using the link below. You can also find out more about what to include on your application and how to contact us for support during the process on the Postgraduate Study link.

Apply Now Postgraduate Study
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"The University of Suffolk empowered me to be better, to aim high and to make positive changes. I found people here that inspired me and supported me through my journey."

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