Leading Better Care describes a modern senior charge nurse/midwife role that will enable frontline clinical leaders to maximise their contribution to delivering safe and effective care.

The review aimed to support the role to ensure a visible, authoritative, credible and accessible presence for patients and families and to provide mechanisms that will give assurance to patients and the public that senior charge nurses/midwives are accountable leaders and managers of safe and effective care.

The clinical coordination, leadership and management functions of the senior charge nurse/midwife to the wider multidisciplinary team highlights their roles as key decision-makers impacting on the delivery of safe and effective care for patients and users of the service.

In parallel with the clinical education careers work, this project aims to demonstrate how the role of senior charge nurse/midwife can be seen as matching the management/leadership aspects of advanced practice.

The work is supported by an education and development framework (NES, 2007) designed to assist senior charge nurses/midwives and service leads in identifying learning and development needs and support them in accessing appropriate learning and development activities, and/or academic education. The framework complements the Advanced Practice Toolkit and helps to ensure that continuing professional development activities are valued and embedded as a lifelong process.

Leading Accountable and Professional Care, a Companion for Senior Charge Nurses and Midwives in NHSScotland was developed in 2011 and aims to support learning and development and practical application of the leadership role.