Nursing Careers UK

Integrated care organisation · Craigavon, Northern Ireland

Nursing Associate at Southern Health and Social Care Trust

Working as a nursing associate at Southern Health and Social Care Trust in Craigavon, Northern Ireland means a caseload that can cross the ward, the outpatient clinic and the patient’s home inside a single organisation, because acute and community services sit under one employer. Band 4 starts at £27,485 on the Northern Ireland 2025/26 scale. No workforce or staff survey figures for this organisation are in the open dataset yet, so this page sets out the caseload, the national pay ladder and where the local courses are, and states nothing it cannot source.

Nursing AssociateBand 4 entryNorthern Ireland
Not published Nursing Associates employed here Organisation-level workforce data is not in the open dataset yet
£27,485 Band 4 starting salary Northern Ireland, 2025/26 scale
Not published Median pay, all occupations Not published in the open data
Not published Staff survey response rate Not in the open dataset for this organisation

The job at Southern Health and Social Care Trust

Nursing associates carry out clinical tasks such as venepuncture, ECGs and recording clinical observations including blood pressure, temperature, respirations and pulse, while maintaining patients' privacy, dignity and safety and supporting them through difficult news. They bridge the gap between healthcare support workers and registered nurses, working alongside both across all four fields of nursing practice. Nursing associates hold a distinct part of the NMC register from registered nurses, and it is a criminal offence to falsely claim the title in England, though the title is not legally protected in Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland. Registered nursing associates can progress to become registered nurses via a shortened apprenticeship route that recognises their prior learning and experience. Patients across all four nursing fields, working alongside healthcare support workers and registered nurses.

At an integrated care organisation such as Southern Health and Social Care Trust, that work means a caseload that can cross the ward, the outpatient clinic and the patient’s home inside a single organisation, because acute and community services sit under one employer. Rotations can follow the pathway rather than the building, so you can see the same patient group in hospital and at home without applying for a different job. Across the profession as a whole, nursing associates work in settings including acute hospitals, community settings, mental health facilities, care homes and hospices — an organisation of this type will run some of those services and not others, which is why two posts with the same job title in the same city can be very different jobs.

Pay is not an employer decision. Agenda for Change is negotiated nationally and set separately in each of the four nations, so Southern Health and Social Care Trust pays band 4 exactly what every other NHS employer in Northern Ireland pays it: £27,485 at the bottom of the band on the 2025/26 scale. What genuinely differs between two employers is the caseload, how rotations are structured, how much protected time you get for supervision and continuing professional development, how much band 6 progression is built into the establishment, and how far you travel between sites. Those are the questions worth asking at interview.

This page states no figure specific to Southern Health and Social Care Trust because none is published in the open data. When the workforce and staff survey feeds include this organisation, the establishment size, the response rate and the theme scores will appear above.

Employer
Southern Health and Social Care Trust
Organisation type
Integrated care organisation
Based in
Craigavon
Nation
Northern Ireland
Regulator
NMC registration required
Usual starting band
Band 4

What you would be paid, band by band

Northern Ireland Agenda for Change rates, 2025/26 — the same at every NHS employer in the nation.

Agenda for Change pay for nursing associates in Northern Ireland
Band Starting Point 2 Point 3 Top of band
Band 4 Entry level £27,485£30,162 £30,162
Band 5 £31,049£33,487£37,796 £37,796
Band 6 £38,682£40,823£46,580 £46,580
Band 7 £47,810£50,273£54,710 £54,710
Band 8a £55,690£58,487£62,682 £62,682
£27,485 Band 4 · Newly qualified First post after registration, for roles that start at band 4 (e.g. nursing associates).
£31,049 Band 5 · Newly qualified First post after registration, usually rotational.
£38,682 Band 6 · Specialist Typically two to four years in; a defined clinical specialty.
£47,810 Band 7 · Advanced or team lead Clinical leadership, complex caseload, supervision.
£55,690 Band 8a · Consultant or service lead Service-wide responsibility or consultant practice.

Nursing Associate pay in detail · The whole Northern Ireland scale · Band 4 nursing associates

Where to train for this job near Craigavon

No university in Northern Ireland is recorded in the dataset as running an approved course for nursing associates, so students placed here are likely to travel in from further afield. There are 2 approved courses in the UK as a whole.

Every approved nursing associate course in the UK

Nursing Associates at other organisations in Northern Ireland

Same registration, same bands, different caseload — the organisation type is the variable, and the size of the establishment tells you how many colleagues and how many rotation slots sit behind the job title.

Published establishments for nursing associates at NHS organisations in Northern Ireland
Organisation Type Based in Full-time equivalent
Belfast Health and Social Care Trust Integrated care organisation Belfast
Northern Health and Social Care Trust Integrated care organisation Antrim
South Eastern Health and Social Care Trust Integrated care organisation Belfast
Southern Health and Social Care Trust This page Integrated care organisation Craigavon
Western Health and Social Care Trust Integrated care organisation Londonderry

A blank establishment figure means the organisation did not return one for this profession, not that it employs nobody. Only organisations whose type runs this service are listed.

Other nursing roles at Southern Health and Social Care Trust

Next steps

Where this page’s data comes from

The figures on this page are national or regional. No workforce, staff survey or inspection data for this organisation is in the open dataset yet.