A major new report on the future of the NHS workforce puts healthcare simulation firmly on the national policy agenda.
"Trained for Tomorrow," published in July 2026 by Policy Connect's Higher Education Commission and the All-Party Parliamentary Health Group, sets out 11 recommendations to fix the pipeline that trains NHS staff. One recommendation is dedicated entirely to simulation. Several others touch it directly.
Here are the key points from the report that highlight the need for Healthcare Simulation to take centre stage in the training of the healthcare workforce.
Who wrote the report?
Policy Connect is a cross-party think tank, specialising in supporting parliamentary groups, forums and commissions. The Higher Education Commission is an independent body made up of leaders from the education sector, the business community and the major political parties. The Commission examines higher education policy, holds evidence-based inquiries, and produces written reports with recommendations for policymakers.
The report calls on professional regulators to formally recognise simulation-based learning as a valued, quality-assured complement to clinical placement hours. This builds on outcome-focused frameworks that already allow it. The report treats this as a destination for every healthcare profession, not just a few.
Formal recognition changes the conversation. Simulation educators stop having to defend their teaching method as a stand-in for the "real thing" and start being judged on outcomes. That shift supports the case for protected teaching time and dedicated simulation roles.
Not every healthcare profession has the same weight of evidence behind simulation yet. Nursing has years of data. Other professions have less. Rather than asking regulators to recognise simulation for all professions at once, the report recommends starting with the professions where the evidence is already strong, then extending recognition to other professions as their evidence base grows. The end goal is the same for everyone: formal recognition across all healthcare disciplines.
In professions still building their evidence base, educators are likely to find themselves with increased workload: delivering simulation and helping generate the outcomes data that will eventually justify formal recognition. Getting involved in evaluation work now puts educators ahead when simulation is recognised as central to training within their profession.
Simulation hours that count toward proficiency and practice learning should only come from providers meeting defined quality standards. The report points to the Association for Simulated Practice in Healthcare (ASPiH) as the benchmark. Recognition and quality assurance go together.
Delivering simulation that counts toward a student's proficiency hours will mean meeting a defined standard, not just running a good session. Educators should expect a stronger push toward ASPiH-aligned training or their healthcare regulator's standards, similar to what currently happens in undergraduate nursing programmes and the NMC.
The Nursing and Midwifery Council has permanently built up to 600 hours of simulated practice into the 2,300 hours required for pre-registration nursing programmes. The NMC's own evaluation found that simulated practice learning improves competence and builds student confidence.
Nurse educators already work inside this model and have a head start on designing curricula that blend simulation and placement hours. That experience is a genuine asset. Educators in other professions can learn from what has worked in nursing, rather than starting from scratch when recognition reaches their own profession.
The report cites the NCSBN National Simulation Study, the largest randomised controlled trial of simulation in nursing education to date. It found no statistically significant difference in outcomes when simulation replaced up to 50% of traditional clinical hours.
This is the kind of evidence educators can put in front of curriculum committees and regulators. It shifts the argument from "simulation might work" to "simulation already has the data behind it," making it easier to secure sign-off, funding, and timetable space for simulation-based teaching.
Placement shortages are named across the report as one of the biggest barriers to training more NHS staff. Simulation is positioned as a practical way to expand training capacity without needing more clinical placement spaces, particularly in professions and regions where placements are hardest to find.
Less time spent chasing scarce placement spots could mean more time spent teaching. But this only holds if institutions treat simulation as its own discipline requiring dedicated staff, not something existing educators absorb on top of an already full workload. The report is explicit that educator capacity is already stretched, so this shift needs its own investment, not just goodwill.
The report highlights that simulation lets students build confidence before facing complex clinical settings. This matters particularly for students with disabilities or anxiety around early practice exposure. Scenarios can be repeated, rare cases can be introduced deliberately, and mistakes carry no risk to real patients.
Running simulation well for these students takes more than technical setup. Educators need training in debriefing and facilitation, and in building psychologically safe environments where students can make mistakes without fear of judgement. That is a distinct skill set from clinical teaching, and the report suggests it is not yet consistently taught to educators themselves.
Professor Jane Harrington, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Greenwich, told the inquiry that simulation is most effective when co-produced with staff and service users. It lets professionals rehearse real care pathways, understand pressures across settings, and build adaptive expertise rather than task-based competence alone.
Co-design moves educators from delivering pre-built scenarios to building them, working alongside clinical staff and patients. That is a more collaborative role and done well, a more rewarding one. It also adds time and coordination to an educator's workload that institutions will need to plan and budget for.
The report features the ALICE Simulator Project at the University of Greenwich, a bespoke ambulance simulator built in memory of paramedic Alice Clark. It doubles as a research platform studying driver behaviour and safety under pressure. It also cites the Hartlepool Health and Social Care Academy, one of a small number of UK facilities with a purpose-built medical simulation suite, delivering training across acute care, specialist procedures, and community care.
Co-design moves educators from delivering pre-built scenarios to building them, working alongside clinical staff and patients. That is a more collaborative role and done well, a more rewarding one. It also adds time and coordination to an educator's workload that institutions will need to plan and budget for.
The report calls for the Regulatory Innovation Office to help healthcare regulators update their standards faster, and for an ongoing evaluation mechanism to track student outcomes, service pressures, and patient outcomes as simulation recognition expands. For simulation providers and educators, the message is clear: the policy direction is moving toward simulation being treated as a core, funded part of clinical training, not an optional extra.
Who wrote the report?
Policy Connect’s latest report, Trained for Tomorrow: A Plan for the Future NHS Workforce, explores the challenges facing the healthcare education pipeline and the action needed to ensure the NHS has the future workforce required to deliver on the Government’s ambitious 10 Year Health Plan. Trained for Tomorrow, published on 13 July 2026, follows a cross-party inquiry led by the Higher Education Commission and the All-Party Parliamentary Health Group and chaired by Kevin McKenna MP, Lord Philip Norton of Louth and Professor Kathryn Mitchell from University of Derby. The inquiry draws on evidence from across the health and education sectors, including universities, NHS organisations, professional bodies, regulators, students, educators, and sector experts.
Sources "Trained for Tomorrow: A Plan for the Future NHS Workforce," Policy Connect, Higher Education Commission and All-Party Parliamentary Health Group, July 2026.*
