Kathmandu, Jan 28: Although more than 7,000 new nurses are produced on a yearly basis from various 117 nursing colleges in the country, their management has been a challenge. It is because of lack of effective government mechanism for creating jobs for them.
Experts suggest reforms at various levels in nursing service to provide access to health for all people where one nurses has to attend around 20 patients in a general ward on the contrary to five patients per nurse according to the World Health organization standard.
Management of the nurses, who are important part of the public health system, has been facing problems as the Ministry of Health lack accurate statistics regarding the number of nurses working in the government and private health facilities in the country, according to Prof Gomadevi Niraula Shrestha, Nursing Director at the Bir Hospital.
Prof Shrestha is also the coordinator of a seven-member team formed by Minister for Health Gagan Kumar Thapa a month ago in a bid to reform the nursing sector in the country with altogether 67,905 registered nurses and auxiliary health assistant.
She stated that the management of one third of the current production of nurses would be possible if the nurses were appointed in the health facilities as per the criteria determined by the government policies.
According to the Ministry’s statistics, there were 20,423 nurses, midwives and nurses as of 2014 among whom 3,683 nurses were recorded to have been working in the private health institutions as of 2013.
Although 7,610 new nurses get graduated yearly on average and despite a high demand for the nurses in the country, many of them have been working as volunteers or opt to leave to greener pasture to secure lucrative job due to the government’s failure to expand quotas for nurses created at home, said Secretary at Nepal Nursing Association, Raj Kumari Gyawali.
Staff nurse Roshani Sharma lamented that although more than Rs 600,000 is required to complete the nursing course, there is inadequate job opportunities for the new nurses at home. RSS
२६ कार्तिक २०८३, बिहिबार
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