Dear Dawn
Please, please don't be put off, there are nursery nurse postions in hospitals as well as play workers but they are both employed to do very different roles.
Nursery nurses are employed to do much more of the care side, which tends to include making up bottle feeds, feeding babies and children, changing nappies, dressing & undressing, bathing etc
However there are more and more roles for play workers all the time, playwork in hospitals is a growing profession with much goverment guidance backing it up. I have worked in the hospital play profession for ten years and sit on the Executive Committee for the National Association of Hospital Play Staff (NAHPS), and it is it is a really exciting and rewarding profession to be involved in.
Hospital Play Staff teams are normally lead by qualified Hospital Play Specialists and there are usually also positions in these teams for Play Workers, also called Play Leaders or Play Assistants who work under the guidance of the Hospital Play Specialists. You are right, the NHS jobs website (
www.jobs.nhs.uk) is not always easy to use or comes up with the positions you are looking for. I would try typing in the words "Play Assistant" or "Play Specialist" and see what comes up. It is still worth looking at the postions that come up saying Play Specialist, because although I know you are not a qualified Play Specialist, because there is a bit of a shortage of qualified Play Specialists in some areas of the country, the in the job description and job specification it may say something like "qualified play specialist or person holding Level 3 in early years, playwork or nursery nursing, and willingness to undertake play specialists qualification.
For info about this area I would suggest you visit the National Association of Hospital Play Staff website
www.nahps.org.uk and consider joining, membership cost £20 per year for Associate Membership, and would really help you.
Have you looked at your choices for Level 3 Option Units for Playwork NVQ yet?? If you want me to suggest which units would be best in you wanted to go into hospital playwork, I could make some suggestions.
Harriet