Cinpoes, Radu ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0002-4930-5609 and Azah, John (2025) Ambitious for Change: A Review of the Nursing and Midwifery Council's (NMC) Fitness to Practise Process (Phase 3). Report. Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC), Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI), London, United Kingdom.

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Abstract

Context and purpose
• The Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC), the independent professional regulator for nurses and midwives in the UK, and nursing associates in England launched in 2019 its ‘Ambitious for Change’ research programme aimed at assessing the impact of its Fitness to Practise (FtP) processes on different groups of professionals.
• The primary goal of the NMC’s Fitness to Practise framework is to protect the public. This is done through ensuring the health, safety, and wellbeing of the public, maintaining confidence in nursing and midwifery professions, and upholding professional standards. Regulatory actions focus on managing future risks to patient safety, not punishing professionals for past mistakes, and are taken swiftly and transparently when necessary. The management of risks is ensured through a process that allows professionals to demonstrate insight and learning by reflecting on actions and by taking steps to strengthen practice. Thus, the engagement with reflection and learning are important factors in determining outcomes of regulatory actions.
• In phase one of the programme, quantitative research found outlying patterns in how groups of professionals based on protected characteristics experience outcomes of regulatory processes. Disparities were identified in the case of the following groups:
o Black professionals compared to White professionals.
o Male professionals compared to female professionals.
o Disabled professionals compared to non-disabled professionals.3
o Professionals with unknown or withheld sexual orientation information compared to heterosexual professionals.
• Starting from findings showing disparities in how groups are treated in the FtP process, this report aims to find out why differences in outcome occur in the cases involving Black relative to White professionals, male relative to female professionals, disabled relative to non-disabled professionals, and professionals with unknown or withheld information on sexual orientation relative to heterosexual professionals.
• The report looks qualitatively at two areas where potential bias might explain differences in how professionals proceed through the FtP stages:
o FtP process – drawing on 270 cases involving registered nurses and midwifery professionals.
o FtP policies and guidance.

Item Type:	Monograph (Report)
Additional Information:	Phase 1: 2019, Phase 2: August 2022, Phase 3: June 2025. - MP
Uncontrolled Keywords:	nursing and midwifery profession, fitness to practise, discrimination, EDI
Subjects:	L Education > LC Special aspects of education > LC5201 Education extension. Adult education. Continuing education R Medicine > R Medicine (General) R Medicine > RT Nursing
Faculty / School / Research Centre / Research Group:	Faculty of Law, Arts and Social Sciences Faculty of Law, Arts and Social Sciences > School of Humanities and Social Sciences
Last Modified:	01 Dec 2025 11:58
URI:	https://gala.gre.ac.uk/id/eprint/51855

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