KwaZulu-Natal Health readies itself for new nurse training curriculum
KwaZulu-Natal Health MEC, Dr Sibongiseni Dhlomo has welcomed the initiative aimed at the provision of totally new programme for nurse training in South Africa.
This, as a delegates from the National Department of Health; the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) as well as the University of Colombia Mailman School of Public Health (ICAP) are converged at Prince Mshiyeni Memorial Hospital to assess its readiness as a site for this new nurse training programme.
The three participating public nursing colleges were selected from the provinces with a high prevalence of HIV: KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga and Free State. Each nursing college is supported in implementing one of the new qualifications. For KwaZulu-Natal it is Prince Mshiyeni Memorial that would offer a 4-year Professional Nurse qualification. Other benefiting provinces are Free State that would offer a Staff Nurse qualification as well as Mpumalanga which will focus on a one year Midwifery qualification.
In welcoming the delegation, KZN Health MEC said the quality health care of the people of Durban South will be greatly enhanced: ‘We are indeed excited with the choice of Prince Mshiyeni Hospital as it is a combo hospital that renders district, regional as well as partly tertiary services and has a total of 22 Primary Health Care clinics linked and managed by the institution. This training will benefit the 1,9 million people that are in the catchment area of this hospital.’
The NEPI Project in South Africa is aimed at supporting the implementation of the recommendations of the Strategic Plan for Nurse Education, Training and Practice, with specific focus on strengthening the health care system through improving the quality of pre-service nursing education.
The objective here is to develop, reconstruct and revitalize the profession to ensure that nursing and midwifery practitioners are equipped to address the disease burden and population health needs in a revitalised healthcare system in South Africa.
It also focuses on strengthening the capacity of the selected public nursing colleges to ensure the production of sufficient numbers of well- prepared and clinically competent nurses that understand the health policy which emphasises the re-engineering of the Primary Health Care. This crop of nurses will be able to provide prevention, care, treatment and support to individuals, families and communities in both concentrated and generalised epidemics.
Accepting the change in nurse training curriculum, MEC Dhlomo, intoned: ‘Here we are bound to get graduates that are professionally competent to meet the ever changing healthcare needs of the people of our province, specifically as they relate to the HIV and AIDS epidemic." Dhlomo also welcomed the fact that for Prince Mshiyeni Memorial Hospital Training Campus, there are already 2 nurse educators that are currently being provided with financial support to pursue a full time 1 year Masters studies at the University of KwaZulu-Natal, a course that also integrates Nurse Initiated Management of Antiretroviral Therapy, NIMAART.
He further applauded the commitment by NEPI partners to build the capacity of the Mshiyeni Hospital academic and clinical faculty by focusing on clinical Sskills laboratories, libraries and the computer laboratories through increase of publications that are relevant to the course.
For clarity, please contact:
Desmond Motha
Cell: 083 295 3901
