Level 3 Diploma in Health and Social Care

Qualification Summary

Overview:

The Level 3 Diploma in Health and Social Care (Northern Ireland) is considered to be a valued qualification in the sector and has recently been reviewed and re-developed by representatives from the social care sector.

This qualification enables learners to develop their experience, knowledge and skills to work with greater complexity or a particular programme of care to become an enhanced practitioner - for example, supporting people who are experiencing palliative or end of life care, people living with a dementia diagnosis or people who have complex needs. Learners will also be able to obtain the skills necessary to support and enable health and social care teams to work effectively and to facilitate their development.

This qualification has been co-designed, with sector representatives, to provide social care practitioners with the opportunity to consolidate and develop their knowledge, skills, competence and practice as those who have practiced in the social care sector for over twelve months.

The qualification is made up of a combination of:

• Group A – mandatory units, applicable to all learners 
• Group B – knowledge only units 
• Group C – combined knowledge and competence units, from which a learner selects those units most appropriate to their practice context and the service user group with whom they are practicing  

The Group A unit credits, when combined with the credits achieved through successful completion of the selected Group B and Group C units, should enable the practitioner to achieve the Level 3 Diploma in Health and Social Care (Northern Ireland). 

NB: The Level 3 Diploma in Health and Social Care (Northern Ireland) can also be undertaken as a stand-alone qualification, that builds on knowledge gained through a practitioner’s successful completion of their induction.

NB: Your employer will be able to offer you advice about whether you are in a role that will enable you to gather the 'naturally occurring evidence' (inclusive of direct observations of practice) to complete this work-based qualification i.e. that the tasks you undertake, as part of your job role, will enable you to meet all of the evidence requirements for the Level of qualification that you are studying.