FDA Health and Social Care Apprentice and independently funded case studies

Three University of Bolton students organised a health promotion event to highlight the importance of breast cancer awareness.

Maisie Gardner, aged 23, Joanne Finch, 34, and Jessica Bobmanuel, 39, are studying health and social care.

Once they have successfully completed the two-year programme, they will be qualified Assistant Practitioners. The foundation degree is an integral part of the Assistant Practitioner apprenticeship and allows the apprentices to move forward toward their endpoint assessment and becoming qualified assistant practitioners.

All three students are currently employed while studying one day a week on the Bolton campus.

Maise works on the Increasing Access to Psychological Therapies (IAPT) programme, Joanne is a healthcare assistant at a GP practice and Jessica is a support worker.

As part of their studies, they chose to set up a stand on campus in Chancellor’s Mall to raise awareness of breast cancer in women and men, after discovering there had been a steep rise in cases over the past two years.

Joanne said: “One in eight women and one in 400 men are diagnosed with breast cancer and we wanted to remind people how important it is to check themselves regularly, what to look for and to go for a mammogram when invited.

“It’s surprising how many people didn’t know quite a lot of the information we were providing and so many men didn’t realise they could even get the disease.

“When we become Assistant Practitioners, it will open different doors for us career-wise, depending on what route we want to take.”

Maisie added: “We are really enjoying the course and this is a great way of putting what we learned into practice.

“We were quite nervous beforehand, but it has been great and everyone has been so nice. A few people have visited us who have been affected by breast cancer in some way to share their experiences.”

Other students also manned two other stands, one focusing on staying healthy and active and the other on sexual health.

On the sexual health stand were Elizabeth Hall, Kerry Moore, Kerry Williams, Jacqueline McFadden, and Cheryl Tench.

On the physical activity and mental health stand were Shirish Singapori, Shirley Colley, David MacKenzie, Yongfeng Zhang, Shan Cen and Candice Ferguson.

Lecturer Dr Joey Weber said: “This was an assessed event as part of my health promotion module. The apprentices did a fantastic job on the day and seemed to get a lot out of the experience.“

All the students are studying health and social care via Foundation Degree Apprenticeships or independently.