SDG3: Good Health and Wellbeing

As a University we are committed to contributing to Northamptonshire being the leading county in the UK for Health and Wellbeing.

Community and Outreach

Our Faculty for Health, Education and Society is the major training centre for nurses, paramedics and other allied health professionals in the county and we have strong corporate links to the Health Community.

We strongly encourage and celebrate outreach programmes amongst our staff and students both as formal parts of their courses or through voluntary action.  Our Health and Wellbeing Changemakers of the Year for 2020 were our Mental Health First Aiders.

Placements are a key part of most of our health-related courses however outreach work for this area is not limited within this faculty.  e.g. Sports students complete 120 hours of community placement providing a range of sporting and physical activity for different sectors of the community including children and the elderly.

Local collaborations

The University collaborates heavily to deliver on our aims of contributing to Northamptonshire being the leading county in the UK for Health and Wellbeing. The Vice-Chancellor personally chairs the Health and Wellbeing Board for Public Health Northamptonshire.

There is an NHS Health Centre/Doctors surgery on Campus and there are close relationships with Northampton General Hospital (NGH) and St Andrews as well as with the local Emergency Services.

Many of our students work within local healthcare settings and we have worked with NGH on delivering an MSc on patient safety and quality improvement which received an outstanding practice rating from the CQC. We also collaborate with St Andrews Healthcare linking mainly around Mental Health Nursing Education. And, working in collaboration with Milton Keynes University Hospital we have delivered a range of CPD modules for their staff to enhance patient outcomes in stroke rehabilitation, Frailty.

During the pandemic the University has played it’s part hosting a walk-in testing centre in Car Park 2.

National collaborations

We also collaborate nationally with a number of NHS trusts and hospitals to deliver programmes (mainly PG Certs) that upskill NHS staff and improve patient outcomes, for example Oxford University Hospitals.

Additionally, our Competency Test Centre is one of only three in the UK that provides the Objective Structured Clinical Examination that enables overseas nurses to practice in the UK.

The University’s Institute for Public Safety, Crime and Justice (IPSCJ) has since 2017 has been supporting the Community Sentence Treatment Requirement (CSTR) Programme across England, through local evaluation and the creation of practice documentation aimed at Clinical Leads and Primary Care Practitioners. Further, in 2019, the IPSCJ reviewed the effectiveness of healthcare services provided to women who had recently given birth or were pregnant in HMP Peterborough.

Global collaborations:

Internationally we have long established collaborations for healthcare delivery in Ireland and Sri-Lanka and a growing number new collaborations across South East Asia whilst our research and publications in this space influence practice globally.

Health Outreach Programmes

Our Sport and Physical Activity Group has the remit of promoting increased movement on and around campus. This has included evaluating walking activity in the post COVID-19 Campus, establishing a Waterside Campus Park Run, and working with Table Tennis England to bring Ping! and table tennis tables to campus for community use. We are also opening a student run Sport Injury Clinic which has open access for the wider community.

The University’s Sports Dome and all weather pitches are available for use and hire.  Local groups from across Northamptonshire including, junior football teams, adult football leagues, women’s netball and Adult Touch Rugby clubs all use our facilities seven days a week.  The Northampton Town FC (first, ladies and junior section teams) and Northampton Saints first teams also use our outstanding facilities for training purposes.

The University, with help for our students have started up a free weekly football session for teenage asylum seekers as part of the  ‘world in motion’ scheme, meaning 14-19 year-olds from across the world can enjoy a game of football for an hour every Saturday at our Waterside campus.  The University also hosts the cerebral palsy annual football cup. 

Student Health and Wellbeing

Our Student Information Desk provides a range of services for students to support health and wellbeing.

Please check out our latest research for SDG3: Good Health and Wellbeing