Health and Social Care Competition

Overview

Health and Social Care practitioners support individuals across a range of settings who may be experiencing ill health, disability or changing care needs.

This WorldSkills UK competition showcases the values, behaviours, skills and professional attitudes required to deliver high-quality, person-centred care. Competitors are expected to demonstrate effective communication, safe working practices and the ability to assess needs, plan, deliver and evaluate care while working in partnership with others.

Through a series of practical exercises, competitors will apply judgement and take appropriate action within their role to support individuals to maintain independence, dignity and control.

The skills you need to demonstrate are relevant across health and social care careers, including care and support roles and pathways into registered professions such as nursing, paramedicine and the allied health professions.

The skills you need to demonstrate

Health, Safety & Infection Control
Person-centred care, empathy, compassion, dignity and respect
Therapeutic communication & professional relationships
Flexibility and adaptability in care delivery
Problem solving, innovation and creativity
Assessing needs, planning and evaluating client care
Co-production and working in partnership
Learning, reflection and continuous improvement

Useful resources

Prepare for competition success

Our library of endorsed local skills competition briefs ‘benchmarking assessments’ helps prepare learners to build technical skills, productivity, and mindset competencies for national competition success, including employability progression pathways.

Paired with the benchmarking tracker, educators can record progress, identifying strengths and target areas for improvement. Together, they offer a reliable, standards-led framework, creating a sustainable model for skills development that supports educators to empower learners to be competition ready.

Access on the Learning Lab

Contact details

worldskills@actan.org.uk

Entry criteria

This is an individual competition.
There is no limit to the number of competitors permitted to enter this competition per organisation.
Competitors must be familiar with the core competencies (these can be found in the ‘Useful resources’ section below) and should be working towards a Level 3 qualification or have achieved a Level 3 qualification in the last 12 months.
Competitors must not have been employed full-time in the sector for more than five years (excluding apprenticeship work).

How it works

1. Register

Registrations open on Monday 2 March 2026, 9am and will close Friday 27 March 2026, midnight.

2. Entry stage

3. National Qualifiers

To be confirmed.

4. Training and Development

To help finalists prepare ahead of the UK Final, we will provide relevant technical training and share mindset development techniques, to support them to remain focused on achieving success.

Prepare students and apprentices by engaging with our benchmarking resources to master their skills and mindset masterclasses to build confidence and resilience on the WorldSkills UK Learning Lab.

5. National Finals

The National Finals are scheduled to take place in Wales during the week commencing 16 November 2026.

6. Squad UK

Competitors who are age eligible and have achieved the benchmark score will be invited to opt into Squad UK for the WorldSkills 2028 cycle, subject to the skill progressing to the international competition cycle.