How to Teach Genomics: A Workshop for Nursing and Midwifery Educators

Nurses and midwives are a large part of the UK healthcare workforce so they will play an increasingly important role in bringing genomics to patients. To enable this shift in healthcare, genomics will need to be incorporated into nursing and midwifery training.

This workshop will equip educators with the knowledge, tools, and confidence to design and deliver genomics teaching appropriate for undergraduate degree nurses and midwives.

In this highly interactive training, participants will hear from experts on how and why genomics healthcare is changing, and also about current and future applications of genomics in nursing and midwifery practice. Discussions will highlight opportunities and challenges of integrating genomics into education for different practice areas. How genomics training is being implemented in other countries, as well as ethical, legal, and social aspects of incorporating genomics into teaching practice will be explored.

Workshop participants will gain insight into genomics from a patient’s perspective, and access to teaching resources, including an educators’ toolkit. Focused group work will offer the chance to work on different teaching scenarios, share ideas, and receive feedback.

Who should attend this workshop?
The workshop is for those based in tertiary education who have active plans to incorporate genomics in their teaching for nurses and midwives. Established educators looking to refresh and update their current undergraduate and postgraduate teaching content are also encouraged to apply. To foster knowledge exchange, we welcome professional educators who teach either midwives, or those from any field of nursing (adult, children and young people, learning disability, and mental health). The workshop will focus on incorporating genomics from a UK perspective. Applicants from elsewhere will be considered if capacity allows.

After attending this workshop, participants will be able to:

• Explain how genomics applies to nursing and midwifery practice
• Identify the roles nurses and midwives play in different patient pathways
• Deliver education and training to meet the knowledge, skills and behaviour requirements of nurses and midwives around genomics
• Demonstrate how genomics can be embedded into existing and new curricula to meet Nursing and Midwifery Council requirements
• Identify and apply existing educational resources to deliver genomics to student nurses and midwives
• Design and disseminate information and materials, and support colleagues within educational institutions to deliver genomics education to nursing and midwifery cohorts

The workshop will run over 4 days, starting at 12:00 on Monday 8 July, and finishing at around 14:00 on Thursday 11 July 2024.
The training will be a blended mix of discussions, small group work and reflective sessions.

Group work will focus on:

• Different teaching scenarios – the learner’s perspective
• Designing and delivering a genomic session for nurses and/or midwives

Discussion sessions will include:

• Genomics in healthcare – where are we now?
• Genomic applications in nursing and midwifery practice
• Integrating genomics into education –where are you and your institution?
• What are the requirements in different areas of practice?
• Integrating the patient perspective into genomics education
• Genomic resources and the educators’ toolkit
• Opportunities and challenges of implementing genomics training into core curriculum
• Interactive international perspectives webinar
• Ethics at the front line: case studies involving genomics
• Preparing the future practitioner – what’s on the horizon?

A detailed programme for the 2024 workshop will released shortly.

Scientific Programme Committee

Amanda Pichini
Genomics England, UK

Edward Miller
Health Education England, UK

Emma Tonkin
University of South Wales, UK

Jodie Coulson
University of York, UK

Instructors and speakers

A list of speakers will be released shortly

Workshop organisers – Wellcome Connecting Science

Jemma Hume – Event Organiser
Jane Murphy – Programme Developer

Prerequisites
Applicants should be involved in the design or delivery of nursing and midwifery education and have active plans to incorporate genomics in their teaching. The workshop is also suitable for established educators who are looking to refresh and update their current teaching content.

How to Apply
Application is through the online form. Please be prepared to upload PDFs of:

1. your CV
2. a short statement (maximum 300 words) justifying your attendance on the course which includes the following information:

• • which branch of nursing or midwife you are involved in teaching
  • any plans you have for incorporating or updating the genomics training you develop or deliver
  • how you would benefit from attending this course
  • any other relevant information, especially if you have a background in nursing or midwifery.

Please note: the registration system will be undergoing routine maintenance 07:00 – 08:00 BST on Sunday 21 April

Places are limited and will be awarded on merit. If you have any problems with the online application process, please contact us.

Application and bursary deadline: 28 May 2024 at 23.59 BST

Participants are encouraged to stay onsite as networking and informal discussion are an important part of this training.

The fee will be requested once acceptance is confirmed.

Bursaries

Wellcome Connecting Science offers registration bursaries (usually 50% of the registration fee) to those who would benefit from training but face financial barriers to attending events.

Bursary applications need to be completed in the online course application form before the deadline.

Please be prepared to:

• explain why you would benefit from funding
• answer questions about your work.

Additional funding opportunities
Visit our support page for additional financial support currently available.

Extra accommodation
If you wish to book onsite accommodation either side of the course dates, please contact the Conference Centre directly.

Accommodation services phishing scam – please be vigilant. More information.

Feedback from the previous course participants

‘Was a fantastic course and feel I got a lot of useful information which I can feed back to my team’

‘The speakers were brilliant – so informative and really engaging. I enjoyed the session where we had to write a teaching session’

‘The small group discussions and group work was really valuable’

‘The size of the course allowed for us all to get to know each other and learn from each other without voices getting lost’

‘A wide range of materials were provided which can be proved useful in the future’