Three-quarters of general practice nursing staff say they feel somewhat ‘confident’ to speak up and raise concerns in the workplace, an exclusive new survey has revealed.
The findings also show that the majority of practice nurses (68%) feel they are given good support from their managers – with 33% ‘strongly agreeing’ and 35% ‘somewhat agreeing’ with this view.
The insights come from a Nursing in Practice survey of 280 practice nursing staff which suggests many nurses feel secure when expressing views with managers.
However, nursing staff shared a range of experiences about speaking up at work, with one practice nurse saying they ‘don’t feel listened to’, while another described being ‘looked after very well’.
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One practice nurse said: ‘I work in a very supportive practice where it is encouraged to speak up and raise concerns as they happen, to avoid harm and risks.’
Overall, 43% ‘strongly agreed’ that they felt confident in speaking up and raising concerns at work, while 32% ‘somewhat agreed’ with this.
Some respondents outlined the risk of speaking up in a practice setting where hierarchies among staff existed.
‘It is difficult in a practice setting, as partners always tend to support the practice managers, but I have had recent issues and have felt I could speak to senior partners,’ one practice nurse said.
Another enhanced level practice nurse recalled: ‘I have been reprimanded for speaking up before and raising safety incidents.’
Despite these challenges, 61% of respondents also ‘strongly agreed’ that they had strong working relationships with other practice team members and 27% ‘somewhat agreed’ with this statement.
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Nursing staff within our survey also shared struggles around appropriately supporting nursing associates working in general practice.
An independent prescriber and nurse manager said: ‘I tried to step in to support my nursing associate as we have been under huge pressure due to sickness and retirements.
‘I was literally shouted out for bringing it up.’
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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.
