http://www.todayonline.com/singapore/nursing-profession-get-welcome-boost
After close to two years of review and consultation, the National Nursing Taskforce is set to announce its recommendations for increasing the attractiveness and boosting the development of the nursing profession by this year.
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Among the suggestions floated by nurses included exposing younger students to information on the profession.
Nurses who attended the dialogue yesterday said the profession is still misunderstood by the public, which deters new entrants to the field.
Last February, the Population White Paper caused an uproar in the nursing community when a footnote classified nursing as a low-skilled job.
Said Ms Reysham Kaur, senior staff nurse at National University Hospital: “Our role is really expanding as well, and doctors are also recognising that and they are working hand in hand with us. So in a way, we actually need to portray this to the public — that nurses are not only doing bedside work.”
Mr Marcus Chia, a staff nurse at Tan Tock Seng Hospital, agreed. “The public perception and the current perception in the healthcare climate is so different. In the hospitals, we work in a team with the doctors and other allied healthcare professionals to deliver care to the patients. However, the public may still think that nurses are handmaidens to doctors.”
He suggested that the image of nursing be improved through advertisements and promotions, and that nurses take on more advanced roles at “the top end of their qualifications”.
For example, nurses holding degrees should be able to practise what they have been taught in the workplace, such as performing health assessments, a task undertaken by junior doctors in the current system here, he said.
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