Shortage of nurses and midwives in Nigeria

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Shortage of nurses and midwives in Nigeria

Unread post by Kunle Emmanuel »

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Less than a quarter of students who apply to study nursing and midwifery courses in Nigeria gain admission due to limited slots, Daily Trust investigations have shown.

Findings show that there are 236 nursing and midwifery institutions with a total approved admission quota of 8,185 annually. The Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria (NMCN) accredits and pegs admission quotas for schools of nursing, midwifery, post basic nursing, and departments of nursing.

The council can provide full or provisional accreditation, place embargo on admission or even withdraw the accreditation of the schools if they fail to meet up with its requirements.

Shortage of nurses and midwives

The nurse’s role in health care delivery system varies from management of new outpatient assessments and monitoring of patients on admission in the wards; taking the patient’s vital signs including height, weight, pulse, temperature and blood pressure and dispensing of prescribed medications.

They also develop closer relationship with the patient more than any other healthcare personnel and are crucial to the smooth running of any hospital.

The nurses provide or assist in providing services in every imaginable area from the surgical theatre, Accident & Emergency, to the paediatric and labour wards.

But according to the Global Health Workforce Alliance, Nigeria has densities of nurses, midwives and doctors that are still too low to effectively deliver essential health services (1.95 per 1,000).

The World Health Organisation (WHO) recommends a nurse to a population ratio of 700, but according to the Open Journal of Nursing 2014, Nigeria has less than 150,000 registered nurses to cater for an estimated 160 million population, giving an average nurse population ratio of 1 to 1,066 people.

Data obtained from the website of the NMCN said there are 120,000 nurses and midwives currently in the country.

The primary challenge for Nigeria is inadequate production and inequitable distribution of health workers.

The health workforce is concentrated in urban tertiary health care centres, the Global Health Workforce Alliance, said.

Few nursing schools

Of the 236 schools accredited, 36 of them lost their accreditation and embargo placed on admission of students, according to data obtained from the council official website.

Of these schools, 86 of them offer nursing; basic midwifery (33), post-basic midwifery (45), post-basic nursing (45), department of nursing (22) and community midwifery programme (5).

The 36 schools currently with embargo are: nursing (12), basic midwifery (5), post-basic midwifery (10), post-basic nursing (9), and department of nursing (1).

Full accreditation by the council lasts for five years and provisional accreditation lasts for two years
.

Geopolitical analysis

Analysis of official data obtained from the council website shows that there are 81 of such accredited schools in the 19 northern states, while the17 states in the south have a total of 146 and three in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

Of the total 8,185 approved admission slots, the northern states have 3,125, while the southern states have 4,930 and FCT 130.

On geopolitical basis, the five states in the Southeast have 48 schools, with the largest admission quota of 1,845. It is followed by Southwest, with 50 schools and 1,655 admission slots.

The South-south with 48 schools has a total admission quota of 1,430.

On the other hand, the Northwest has 39 schools with 1,585 admission slots, followed by North central with 25 schools and 925 slots. The Northeast has the least number of schools (17) and admission slots of 615.

State-by-state analysis

States with highest number of admission quota are: Kaduna 490 (15), Lagos 490 (14), Anambra 490 (10), Enugu 480 (14), Kano 382 (9), Imo 380 (10), Edo 375 (15), Osun 365 (9), Oyo 360 (13), Plateau 345 (8), Ebonyi 275 (5), Cross River 270 (10), Akwa Ibom 270 (9), Sokoto 255 (6), Delta 230 (6), Abia 220 (9), and Rivers 205 (6).

States with least slots are Benue 30 (4), Nasarawa 50 (1), Gombe 60 (2), Taraba 75 (2), Bayelsa 80 (2), Yobe 90 (2), and Adamawa 90 (2).

Others with less than 200 are: Niger 100 (2), Jigawa 100 (1), Ondo 100 (2), Kebbi (2), FCT 130 (3), Zamfara 128 (3), Katsina 130 (3), Bauchi 140 (3), Ekiti 150 (4), Borno 160 (6), Kogi 160 (4), Kwara 170 (6), and Ogun 190 (8).

Struggle for fewer slots

Investigations by Daily Trust revealed that nursing institutions admit students far above their approved quota.

A two thousand people applied to Rivers State School of Nursing and 500 were admitted against its approved quota of 205.

In Gombe state, 1,000 candidates jostled for 50 slots in the state’s College for Nursing and Midwifery annually.

The college admits students’ twice-a-year for training in General Nursing and Midwifery.

An investigation by Daily Trust revealed that applicants pay N3, 000 each for application forms.

The college admits students twice-a-year for training in General Nursing and Midwifery, the acting Provost of the college, Mrs Pauline Doka said.

According to the acting provost, the number of applicants seeking for admission into the general nursing training is much higher than those seeking for admission into the midwifery programme.

The Bauchi State School of Nursing also has 50 slots annually for Basic Nursing courses and about 500 applicants, the director of the school, Mallam Adamu Ahmad, said.

The Katsina state School of Nursing Katsina and that Midwifery, Malumfashi set up in 1956, gained full accreditation only last year.

Over 5,000 students apply annually but only 50 are admitted.

The state commissioner of Health, Mariya Usman said this was the ugly situation that was confronted by the new administration.

She said, government rose to the challenge by providing all the necessary requirements for the NMCN and this has led to the NMCN increasing the number of students that can be admitted in to 100.

Some of the measures adopted include, the upgrading and renovation of the infrastructure at about N120m. Recruitment of tutors and admin staff of one 1:10 ration.

In Plateau state, for the 2012/2013 academic session, Daily Trust gathered that out of the almost 430 applicants for nursing at the University of Jos Teaching Hospital, none was admitted due to problems associated with accreditation.

Our correspondent however gathered that during the 2013/2014 academic year, about 635 candidates had applied but only 61 were admitted while for the 2014/2015 academic year, another 61 were admitted out of 808 that applied.

At the Shehu Sule College of Nursing and Midwifery Damaturu, 335 admission forms were sold, 315 sat for the examination and 200 passed.

A staff who pleaded for anonymity said that 120 candidates were admitted, after six months, another exams and verification was conducted where 108 candidates passed the exercise.

He said that 70 out of the 108 admitted students are nurses and 28 are for midwifery courses.

He said after three years of rigorous academic pursuit only 50 and 40 students from the Nurses and Midwifery were accredited to take the final examination.

The Benue State School of Nursing in Makurdi has just been reaccredited and reopened six months ago by the national regulatory body after four years of closure for failure to upgrade facilites.

The principal, Mrs. Pauline Atser told our correspondent that over 1,000 applied for the current session but only 80 were admitted. The figure dropped to 55 after another round of examination, she said.

She however added that the nursing regulatory council require only 40 students every year.

In Borno state, only 11 percent of applicants gain admission into Borno College of Nursing and Midwifery.

Out of the about 900 candidates applying for admission into the Borno state College of Nursing and Midwifery every year, only 100 finally gain the admission. The Provost of the College, Hajiya Rukayya Shettima, said the restriction of the yearly students’ admission is in compliance with the requirement of the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria.

The Provost said the college, which gained its present status after the merger of the Nursing and Midwifery schools in 2016, now has 51 teachers, out of which only 17 are qualified.

Additional reporting by Lami Sadiq (Jos), Habibu Aminu (Katsina), Hamisu Kabiru Matazu (Damaturu), Balarabe Alkassim (Bauchi), Haruna Gimba Yaya (Gombe), Victor Edozie (Port Harcourt), Hope Abah (Makurdi), Uthman Abubakar (Maiduguri).

source:https://www.dailytrust.com.ng/news/gene ... 01413.html
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Re: Shortage of nurses and midwives in Nigeria

Unread post by Queenet »

There are 126 Nursing and Midwifery Schools in the South and 83 in the North

There were 173,574 Registered Nurses, and 114,468 Midwives Registered by the council as at Thursday last week making a total of 288,042 nurses and midwives.

Schools of Nursing and Midwifery produce bout 6000 nurses and 2,696 midwives yearly - The Registrar, Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria, Alhaji Faruk Umar.
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Re: Shortage of nurses and midwives in Nigeria

Unread post by gopal »

Nursing jobs in Saudi Arabia will pay you much more money as compared to Australia, however, Canada and European countries are paying too much money for that too
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Re: Shortage of nurses and midwives in Nigeria

Unread post by gopal »

How can anyone apply for online nursing courses because it is a professional which has a trending future?
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