In their article Children’s nursing: is it time to rethink field-specific training? (opinion, page 12), Edward Purssell and Rohit Sagoo ask if it is time to rethink child field-specific undergraduate education. Children’s nursing was recognised to be different from general nursing as long ago as 1919 and there have been attempts to remove it from the nursing register. However, following consultation to reflect modernising nursing careers in 2007-08, the Nursing and Midwifery Council continued to recognise children’s nursing as a discrete field of practice.