Scotland’s midwife of the year, Marie Carroll-Smith, is one of the many staff who are revalidating in September.

Marie, who works at Wishaw General Hospital, won her prestigious title as the Mums’ Midwife of the Year 2016 for Scotland in The Royal College of Midwives’ Annual Midwifery Awards.

Revalidation, which began in April, hits its peak in September and in Lanarkshire alone over 300 staff need to hit the 1 September deadline.

Revalidation is a requirement from the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) to promote good practice. Every three years, nurses and midwives will have to revalidate by showing they meet the requirements. These include evidence of 35 hours of continuing professional development over three years, five pieces of practice feedback and five written “reflective accounts” to have a reflective discussion with another registered nurse or midwife, and a confirmation discussion to ensure you have met the requirements.

Marie said: “I had been thinking about revalidation since the beginning of the year but was dreading the prospect of starting something new that I didn’t really understand.

“The regular emails from the NMC to remind me how long I had to go until revalidation and what was expected from me definitely helped to spur me on. I had already kept both a paper copy and a file on my computer for my portfolio so I knew I had just to transfer some of the information onto the NMC templates.

“The NMC online site is brilliant and shows you step by step what is required. There are templates for every element of revalidation and they demonstrate how everything should be set out.

“It also gives examples of the evidence being linked to the NMC code, which I found very useful.

“On the ward we continually reflect with our colleagues so the reflective element wasn’t as difficult as I had initially thought. Feedback can be written or verbal, positive or negative, and can be from patients, patients’ families, colleagues and students.

“It’s definitely not as difficult as I first thought!”