Local midwives qualify as the first registered nurses from Truro and Penwith University Centre

Two local mums qualify as first registered nurses from Truro and Penwith University Center Both have secured highly skilled jobs at Treliske Hospital The opportunity to train locally while living at home with their ‘essential’ families to make their nursing dreams come true.

Two local mums are celebrating being the first registered nurses to qualify from Truro and Penwith University Centre.

Toni McIntyre, a mother-of-three from Redruth, and stepmother Rebecca Armstrong, from St Austell, both qualified as Nursing Associates at the University Center before taking the top-up course to become registered nurses.

Neither nurse had to travel far from the University Center to find work, with both nurses securing highly skilled jobs across the road at Cornwall’s Main Hospital, Treliske.

“We’re home nurses,” says an excited Toni. “Patients ask all the time, ‘where did you have to go to train?’ And they get so excited when you say ‘oh I trained in Cornwall’.

Being a mother, being able to continue her career locally and living at home was essential for Toni. For Rebecca, it has proved ideal to have Bodmin’s new multi-million pound STEM and Health Skills Center on her doorstep, where student nurses train one day a week with the latest equipment in the suites health simulation.

Asked how it feels to be the University Center’s first registered nurses, both students laughed and commented, “Scary! As if it were really torturous; when you are a student and something goes wrong in the ward, you go and ask the nurse in blue. Now we are the nurses in blue.”

Both students are used to the pressure, having started their journey as nurses on the wards in Treliske during the Covid 19 crisis. Toni returned to work 17 years after first starting out in healthcare and Rebecca in higher education after 10 years in the Navy.

As mature students, they were concerned about the academic side of the course. Both were surprised at how they adapted and said the support from university tutors was amazing. Both also praised the realistic simulation suites at Truro and Bodmin and said the equipment was realistic to what they used professionally on the job.

Both agreed that studying the Nursing Associate course first, which is filled with short placements, would allow them to experience all the distinct roles in healthcare so they could then decide which sector they enjoyed the most and they wanted to specialize as registered nurses.

Rebecca has chosen to work in hematology and Toni is going to the intensive care unit, both at Treliske.

Tamzin Irvin, Lead for Nursing and Allied Health at Truro and Penwith University Centre, comments: “Their dedication, professionalism and compassionate care for patients throughout their course has been exemplary. It has been a privilege to support them through their NA qualification and now to see them progress to their full Nursing Diploma.

“We are so proud to provide local people like Toni and Becca with pathways to advancement in nursing and allied health, and we look forward to continuing to expand the local workforce.”

Applications are still open to study at Truro & Penwith University Center in 2024. Visit www.truro-penwith.ac.uk/uni to find out more, apply online and register for an open event.