Advanced clinical practice: an introduction

Advanced clinical practice is a defined level of practice within clinical professions including nursing, pharmacy, paramedics and occupational therapy. This level of practice is designed to transform and modernise pathways of care, enabling safe and effective skill sharing across traditional professional boundaries.

The advanced clinical practice framework is multi-professional and offers senior clinicians the opportunity to work across the four advanced clinical practice pillars:

• clinical practice
• leadership and management
• education
• research

Health Education England (2017) provides a definition of advanced clinical practice, as well as its underpinning standards and governance. The framework ensures that advanced clinical practitioners, their professional colleagues, the public, education providers and employers have a consistent understanding of the level of practice across multi-professional roles and geographical areas.

Advanced clinical practitioners are deployed in most healthcare settings. Some work in acute care, such as in