Curricula for nursing, midwifery reviewed

The Nursing and Midwifery Council of Ghana has reviewed the curricula for the training of nurses and midwives to meet current trends in the sector.

The revision is a regulatory policy to subject the curricula to amendment every five years to ensure standards in nursing and midwifery training.

The last revision of the curricular was in 2012.

New courses

At a ceremony to launch the revised curricula in Accra last Tuesday, the Registrar of the Council, Felix Nyante, said new courses had also been incorporated into the revised version.

For instance, he said, entrepreneurial skills such as marketing relations had also been incorporated into the curricula to give nurses and midwives a wide range of skills and programmes to widen their scope.

Other courses, he mentioned, included Supply Chain Management, Nursing informatics, Therapeutic Communication, CHPS, Adolescent Sexual Reproductive Health, French and Sign Language.

The sign language and the study of French is to enable the nurses to communicate effectively with persons with disability and French-speaking neighbours when they visit health facilities in the country.

Mr Nyante indicated that the new curricula would be used for examination in July and August this year.

Commitment
In a speech read on his behalf, the Minister of Health, Mr Alex Segbefia, said there was a critical need for the curricula to be reviewed to make it possible for current trends in nursing and midwifery to be incorporated into their studies in line with the Health Professions Regulatory Bodies Act, 2013 (Act 857), which mandated the council to establish standards and provide guidelines for the development of a curriculum for the training of nurse assistants, nurses and midwives.

On the inclusion of the new courses, Mr Segbefia commended the Council, saying that “the inclusion of the sign language and French in the curricula is not just innovative but demonstrates a commitment to ensuring that feedback received from clients and patients are utilised for improved services”.

“I have no doubt that this will go a long way to address challenges faced by our hearing impaired brothers and sisters as well as citizens from our neighbouring countries, most of whom cannot speak English, yet have to seek health care from our facilities when they find themselves here,” he intimated.

The minister expressed hope that “the implementation of these curricular will lead to the production of a new crop of nurses and midwives who will endear themselves to the public.”