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Gauteng discusses problems facing nursing profession
Government Communication and Information System, BuaNews
2006-10-06
The Gauteng Department of Health is hosting a two-day Nursing Education Conference to discuss major challenges facing the nursing profession in the province.
The conference, which ends today, is discussing issues such as training more nurses, with specific reference to the critical shortage of nurses in hospitals, districts, primary health care and health priority programmes.
Addressing the conference Tuesday, Health MEC Brian Hlongwa said the event was in response to the National Department of Health's Human Resource Plan.
The plan attempts to deal with the crisis at the national level and the Gauteng Provincial Government Human Resources Strategy deals with challenges and opportunities that we face as a province.
Mr Hlongwa said the combined shortage of nurses and medical doctors compelled the provincial health department to revisit its training priorities and strategies.
We need to determine which categories need to be prioritised in order to ensure that adequate numbers of qualified auxiliary, enrolled, professional, and specialist nurses are available to meet the increased demand for quality patient care, he said.
Gauteng has since identified several issues as needing urgent attention regarding nurses, including improved remuneration and conditions of service.
In addition, the province wants to review of nursing qualifications and scopes of practice.
The shortage of nurses in the province prompted Gauteng Premier Mbazima Shilowa, in his State of the Province address in 2004, to commit to increase the intake production of nurses by 20 percent per annum as from the 2004/2005 financial year said the MEC.
As a result of this emphasis, the provincial health department's annual report showed the it has managed to retain many of its critical staff members in the past two financial years.
According to the annual report, the total vacancy rate for professional nurses declined in the 2003/04 financial year.
The attrition rate for doctors improved from 35.8 percent to 21.2 percent in the same period.
Last year, the department managed to recruit 7 302 new employees.
A total of 2 950 health professionals were among the new employees recruited and this figure was above the target of 2 500 set by Mr Shilowa.
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