More than a third of general practice nursing staff say they ‘never’ have clinical supervision, according to an exclusive survey.
Some practice nurses said supervision opportunities were often only part of their annual appraisal, while others suggested they had not had time for formal reflection for several years.
These were the findings of a Nursing in Practice survey of 280 general practice nursing staff carried out last month.
Respondents were asked how often they had clinical supervision – a formal process of support, reflection, learning and development – within the workplace.
Concerningly, the most popular answer was ‘never’ – cited by 37% of respondents.
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Meanwhile, 16% said they had clinical supervision ‘a few times a year’, while 13% said they had this ‘every few months’ and 9% said they were given these opportunities monthly.
Some 5% said they were only given clinical supervision on a yearly basis and just 8% said they were given this weekly.
One practice nurse responding to our survey, who is also a professional nurse advocate, said it was ‘a shame that [supervision] is not prioritised throughout primary care’.
An enhanced level practice nurse suggested they had not had clinical supervision ‘since before Covid’, while another said the process was ‘not well structured’.
One advanced nurse practitioner said: ‘I have to get my own clinical supervision whilst doing other work and from GP colleagues in general who are personal friends.’
Some respondents pointed to their annual appraisal as the only opportunity they were given for clinical supervision, or that time for reflection was ‘not protected’.
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NHS England supervision guidance for primary care network (PCN) multidisciplinary teams suggests nursing associates and advanced nurse practitioners in general practice should all have access to monthly clinical/professional supervision meetings.
The guidance, published in May 2023, covers those staff employed under the Additional Roles Reimbursement Scheme – something that general practice nurses were recently added to.
While the guidance does not currently cover registered nurses, it states that for nursing associates, supervision meetings should be carried out with a registered nurse or ‘other healthcare professional including advanced practitioner’.
For advanced practitioners, these meetings should take place with a GP, consultant practitioner or experienced recognised advanced practitioner, the guidance states.
In its NHS Long Term Workforce Plan in 2023, NHS England recognised that ‘focused support for staff wellbeing through restorative supervision can have a positive impact on both staff and patients’.
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And it stressed that ensuring staff have access to ‘supportive supervision’ was ‘a core responsibility for all employers’.
There are several different models for clinical supervision, including ‘resilience-based’, ‘restorative’ and ‘Proctor’s three-function models’, among others.
This survey was open between 31 March and 14 April 2025, collating responses using the SurveyMonkey tool. A total of 280 GP nursing staff from across the UK responded to these questions. The survey was advertised to our readers via our website and email newsletter, with a prize draw for a £200 voucher as an incentive to complete the survey. We asked for practice codes or practice names and postcodes, and asked them to confirm what role they held. We removed those with duplicate email addresses, and searched for duplicate IP addresses, removing obvious duplicate entries. The survey was unweighted, and we do not claim this to be scientific – only a snapshot of the GP nursing staff population.
