Two UK companies are selling healthcare assistant Care Certificates online with the claims that they can be completed at home.
Editor of Independent Nurse’s sister journal, British Journal of Healthcare Assistants, Peter Bradley discovered that two companies were selling the certificates on eBay for less than £50.
Mr Bradley was able to complete the certificates at his desk without entering a clinical setting.
However, Skills for Health, Skills for Care and Health Education England said in a joint statement about online traders that it is ‘not possible to achieve the Care Certificate through completion of e-learning or completing a workbook alone’. The organisations stated that assessment must be undertaken in the workplace, unless simulation is explicitly allowed.
Mr Bradley paid £36 to buy the Care Certificate course from HRUK Group of Leeds, which claimed its courses ‘are recognised by the Care Quality Commission and Ofsted’, a claim rejected by both organisations. In an email to Mr Bradley, HRUK said that the course was accredited by the CPD Standards Office, but reputable sources have said that they have never heard of it.
The second company selling the Certificate was called prodigy_traders. No comment was received from them at the time of publication.
Mr Bradley added: ‘The thought that I could be considered competent at cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) after reading a few pages and watching a one-minute video from Resuscitation Council (UK) is appalling.’
The Care Certificate was developed as part of the Cavendish review, as a way to identify standards in the unregulated NHS workforce.
The full article will be in the November issue of BJHCA.