Nursing

OU nursing graduate Leeanne Macpherson

If you work in healthcare and wish to upskill to become a registered nurse, or are a healthcare provider interested in enabling your staff to study nursing, discover our flexible Scottish Government-funded Open University (OU) nursing degree programme. 

Across Scotland our students can stay employed to ‘earn as they learn’, and employers can retain their workforces, with our Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC)-approved degrees that blend both online and practice-based learning.

As well as nursing degrees we offer other courses for healthcare professionals, at diploma and certificate level.

OU nursing graduate Elvira Viray

The OU funded pre-registration nursing degree programme offers Bachelor of Science (Honours) Nursing degrees - studied part-time over four years - in all four fields of nursing practice: adult, mental health, learning disability, and children and young people.

The programme has one intake date each year, in October. The next intake will be for an October 2027 start, with applications opening in spring 2027 (exact date to follow). Applications for our October 2026 programme closed on 17 April 2026.

The programme is available to healthcare support workers at every NHS board in Scotland. Our Scotland nursing team can be contacted for eligibility enquiries from healthcare support workers in other public sector and health and social care settings, plus partnership enquiries from employers of both. (Eligibility is subject to Scottish Government approval.)

Please check our information booklet (PDF, 932 KB) for the OU programme’s entry requirements and to ensure that you meet them before applying. If required, discover options for potentially gaining evidence of the necessary literacy and/or numeracy levels (PDF, 47.7 KB).

Successful applicants who already have 120 academic credits from either the Higher National Certificate in Healthcare Practice, or the OU Certificate of Higher Education in Healthcare Practice, are able to transfer credit from these towards their OU nursing degree and start studying with us at part two of the programme.

Complete our form to register your interest.

Care worker speaking with an elderly man

Healthcare workers may wish to study our:

Employers can sponsor their staff to do these qualifications. Other potential financial support options include a part-time fee grant for undergraduate students with personal incomes of under £25,000.

Visit our fees and funding page for details.

Image of OU graduate Mairi Claire Davidson with the quote Without the OU learning option, I'd never have been able to become a nurse.

Discover Mairi Claire's full story.