The trained comprehensive nurses, who have been unemployed since graduating when government introduced the program in 1994, may have reasons to smile following a move by government to integrate them into public service.
The registered comprehensive nurse and the enrolled comprehensive nurse training programs started in Uganda in 1994 and 2003 respectively but since then there has been no clear recruitment policy for the graduates.
But this is now set to change owing to a latest decision by government. Jimmy Lwamafa, the permanent secretary in the ministry of Public Service has issued a communication to the health service commission saying the comprehensive nurses should be recruited in the next recruitment exercise.
Lwamafa, in a March 5th letter to the secretary of Health Service Commission, said the scheme of service for the Nursing cadres should integrate the comprehensive nurses at both registered and enrolled levels.
He directed that consideration should be given to university graduates and comprehensive nurses in the forthcoming recruitment. Lwamafa, however, added that the post of a Nursing Assistant has been abolished to help professionalize the nursing cadre.
Some of the positions included in the scheme of service for the nursing cadre include Director of Health Services in charge of Nursing, Senior Nursing Officer and Nursing Officer among others.
The move has caused excitement among some of the trained comprehensive nurses. Bosco Ejoma, a registered nurse, says that it has been difficult to gain employment in public service in the past forcing some of them to abandon the career for alternative employment.
Ancieta Abio Dramadri, the principal Soroti School of Comprehensive Nursing, says it is a relief that government is finally going to employ the nurses. She said several of the graduates have either joined the private sector or pursued further studies in order to gain employment. She explained that hundreds of trained comprehensive nurses are unemployed because government has been reluctant to employ them.
Martin Eyoru, an assistant District Health Officer in Soroti, said he is not aware of a government policy banning the employment of nurses but said the dilemma of employing the nurses has always been a limited wage bill imposed by the public service. As a result, he said the health sector in the district is lacking several human resources to help provide adequate service to the population.
A comprehensive nurse is expected to provide preventive, promotive, curative and rehabilitative services to the community as well as extend primary health care to all sections of the community among other duties.
In 2010, government with the help of the United Nations Population Fund commissioned a study to evaluate the training programs of registered and enrolled comprehensive nursing in Uganda but the findings are yet to go public. The study followed complaints that the training of the comprehensive nurses was inadequate.
However, the latest move by government to begin recruiting the nursing cadres may indicate a solution has been found.
