Entrance qualifications for nursing courses have been lowered at Oxford Brookes University in a bid to encourage more recruits.

Just five GCSEs are needed to enter the three-year diploma course which has been developed jointly with Oxford hospitals.

Until now, people without A-levels who want to start a career in nursing have had to travel to Reading, Northampton and Stoke Mandeville hospitals.

As with the nursing degree, diploma students will have their tuition fees paid.

But unlike their undergraduate colleagues, they will get a grant of £5,000, which is not means-tested, compared with the means-tested bursary of up to £4,800 for students with a degree.

Pay would be the same for nurses with both qualific- ations.

Patricia Marquis, regional officer at the Royal College of Nursing said: "In the past, a typical nurse was an 18-year-old school leaver.

"Now it is someone in their 20s who may be married and have children, so they would not be as mobile.

"This will be an opportunity for people in Oxford to train to be a nurse locally.

"I think that for a long time in Oxford there has been a high threshold to get into nursing and that may have discriminated against a lot of people. This will open the gates."

Liz Westcott, principal lecturer, who has led the team designing the courses, said patients would not be able to tell the difference between nurses with a degree or a diploma.

She said: "The diploma course has a lower academic level than the degree. The main thing from the patients' point of view is that they would not see a difference.

"They would see a skilled practitioner. We cannot say how many places there would be on the diploma courses.

"There would be no overall drop in the number of nursing places at Brookes.

"We will not decide how many places there will be until after we have interviewed prospective students and know the levels of applicants we receive."

The new Diplomas are in Adult Nursing, Learning Disability Nursing and Mental Health Nursing and have been developed by the university's School of Health Care.

Entry requirements are five GCSEs grade C or above, including English, maths and a science subject or an NVQ level three or above.

There will be an open morning tomorrow from 9.30am to 12.30pm at the John Radcliffe Hospital, Oxford, to give prospective students the chance to meet staff.

For an application pack, contact 01242 223707.