Careers Week activity   |13 July 2023

NIHSS course leader Flavie Dubel

New club launched to promote nursing

By Vidya Gappy

As part of activities to mark Careers Week, the ‘Nursing Aspiring Club’ and its new logo were officially launched yesterday at the National Institute for Health and Social Services by the Nurses Association of the Republic of Seychelles (Nars) in collaboration with national stakeholders.

The aim of the club is to market the nursing career by educating the students about the nursing profession and trigger their interest for a career in nursing and provide the right information on the profession.

The Nursing Aspiring Club at secondary schools is an activity with the purpose of sustaining the campaign in developing interest in the youth to take up nursing as a profession and support the national health system to boost up human resources in nursing on a long-term basis.

The Nurses Association of the Republic of Seychelles (Nars) has taken up this initiative since last year in collaboration with the Ministry of Education, the career guidance section and the Ministry of Health namely the National Institute for Health and Social Services (NIHSS).

The new logo was designed by Francisco Mousbe from Plaisance secondary school.

Nars president, Rosie Bistoquet, shared that worldwide, including in Seychelles, nurses have critical roles and responsibilities in all pandemic situations. 

“They have continued to be at the front line of patient care in health centres at community level hospitals and actively involved with evaluation and monitoring in the community. They remain key players in stopping the pandemic especially in the prevention and control of infections including Covid-19 infection. They have supported health facilities, work places in empowering workers to maintain a healthy work environment to control and manage the outbreak.”

Based on evidence from 2022, Nars in partnership with the Ministry of Education and MoH found it necessary to do a campaign to promote nursing in Seychelles under a small government grant from the Ministry of Finance. This year, again Nars got the support to bring along the ‘Nursing Aspiring Club’ in secondary schools.

In the previous two years effort was placed in marketing the profession through electronic and print media. Therefore, the club will offer students an opportunity to have ample information on nursing supported by qualified nurses to join the nursing profession in Seychelles. It will also establish closer rapport with nurses and the environment in which nurses work. The project will open an opportunity for more young people to join the nursing career and will result in improved nurse manpower.

Flavie Dubel, nursing course leader at the NIHSS, expressed that nursing is a profession that is on high demand.  “There is constant staff turnover in nursing practice thus leaving a gap in the health care system. Nurses can be considered as the two arms of the health care system of the country; more often than not, referred to as the heart of healthcare. Needless to say, to maintain such qualities, the country requires a well-educated, competent and adaptive nursing workforce.”

Ms Dubel spoke about the various courses available at NIHSS and its requirements. “Three years might seem long, but it goes by in the blink of an eye. The nursing programme has adopted a learner-oriented teaching-learning style which, considering that the students are young adults, thereby shouldering responsibility for their own learning, but nevertheless guided by lecturers as facilitators. The profession does not end with the basic three-year training, instead, the programme also supports the future of the nursing profession. It paves the way for higher education and specialisations…”

Dr Gylian Mein, chief nursing officer, shared that in December 2022, there were 623 practicing nurses with 73% working in the public sector and 27% working in the private health sector. “Despite the recruitment of newly graduated nurses, the number and skills sets (acquired through work experience) of those new recruits have not been sufficient to fill the gap. In the past two years, the MoH has recruited 41 newly graduates from the NIHSS. We cannot deny that things have changed so much from Nightingale, but the concepts of serving advantaged and disadvantaged equally is still the pillar of the nursing profession. Hence, it is also important to try to attract more people to this profession since it is evident that we need them to be able to attain our main objective of reduction of morbidity and mortality.”

During the programme, the attendees were able to hear a poem on ‘Nursing a noble profession’, and a presentation by Nathalie Vital about her profession as a nurse. The facilitators of each school comprising a nurse and a teacher of Personal, Social and Citizenship education were introduced and all received a certificate.

The event ended with a beautiful song by the Perseverance secondary school choir.

Photos: Leanne Alcindor