Postgraduate nursing institute to be developed – Min. Anthony announces

Recognising that there is a need for more upskilled personnel in the nursing profession, the government through the Ministry of Health has unveiled plans to develop a postgraduate nursing education programme.

Minister, Dr Frank Anthony made the announcement at the launch of the first online Professional Nursing Training Programme, at the ministry’s boardroom, Brickdam, last Monday.

Postgraduate nursing education involves further study after completion of a bachelor’s degree. In the nursing sciences field, postgraduate education generally recommends that a graduate specialises in a particular field or study within the nursing discipline.

Minister Anthony said without programmes such as these, Guyana will not be able to lift the standards of providing health care in areas such as oncology, and cardiovascular surgeries, among others.

“There’s a whole host of things we want to do but we still need specially trained people … Our training has been a little bit ad-hoc and therefore, just like how we have a postgraduate institute to train doctors, we are going to develop a postgraduate institute to train Nurses, we can’t have one without the other and that is extremely important,” the health minister pointed out.

These initiatives form part of a holistic approach to improving the delivery of healthcare services in Guyana. Additionally, the three-year Professional Nursing Training Programme is being facilitated through Coursera and will see 1,160 nursing students being trained through online and in-person classes.

To this end, the ministry’s Department of Training is aiming to offer its programmes through this hybrid approach. The practical component of the training will be conducted in simulation centres that are being developed by the government.

“I think we can start working to bringing them online and giving people access to them so that they can stay at home and go through some of these programmes … Nursing is actually a pioneer in this regard, because you’re going to open up a new way for us to train health personnel in Guyana … and I think this is quite exciting,” Dr Anthony expressed.

The government is aiming to train 1,000 nurses annually to bridge the gap in the nursing profession that is a consequence of the brain drain of nurses in Guyana.

Some $500 million was allocated in budget 2023 to train healthcare professionals.