Advanced roles in cancer nursing

摘要

I have worked in the NHS for the past 10 years. Even as a student nurse with exposure to many different specialties, I knew early on that my passion was oncology. With the enthusiasm to continue academic study after qualifying, I wanted to tailor my career to include academia alongside clinical work. I embarked on the Cancer Nursing Diploma at the Royal Marsden Hospital and this provided the opportunity to work in many different cancer settings while studying. I then worked in a cancer critical care unit, as junior sister on a women's surgical ward, as a clinical nurse specialist (CNS) in gynaecology-oncology and for the past 3 years have been a Macmillan advanced nurse practitioner (ANP) for gynaecology-oncology. My role is very diverse and I started in post when the role was relatively new in the trust. Embarking on a new role was both exciting and daunting. There were no previous colleagues to shadow and a service needed to be developed. I had read huge amounts around the role of the ANP (e.g. McDonnell et al, 2015) and knew that the overarching aim was to make a difference for patients.