IA Blog: Stories of Aid
Equipping Nurses in Ghana
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Forty students beamed in anticipation as they gathered together at the University of Ghana on May 30, 2011. They were going to be the first class enrolled in a new program at the school. They were going to be educated by professionals. They were going to save lives.
And their enrollment in this program couldn’t have come at a better time.
Thousands of children die every year in Ghana from preventable diseases, with approximately 5,000 children under the age of five dying from malaria each year. To address this situation, the Ghanaian Ministry of Health has predicted that, over the next 10-15 years, Ghana needs an additional 1,000-1,500 pediatric nurses.
These students were a part of this summer’s launch of The Ghana-SickKids Paediatric Nursing Training Programme. The program, developed by the University of Ghana and SickKids International, was created to address Ghana’s low rate of child survival and a nation-wide nurse shortage.
“The first cohort of students radiated with pride as each speaker approached the podium, challenging the nurses to increase the health of children in Ghana,” said SickKids International’s Pat Malloy, an advanced practice nurse.
International Aid is actively supporting The Ghana-SickKids Paediatric Nursing Training Programme, which seeks to educate nurses in pediatric knowledge, skill and judgment; improve availability of nurses and pediatric medical assistance across Ghana; improve child survival; and improve the ability to train and retain nurses. The students will be trained by a combination of SickKids International employees and Ghanaian health professionals.
International Aid has assisted by providing medical supplies for The Ghana-SickKids Paediatric Nursing Training Programme such as incubators, IV supplies, pediatric resuscitators, vital signs monitors, nebulizers, scales, thermometers, hand sanitizer, pediatric cribs and mattresses, blood pressure gauges and much more.
SickKids International project manager Dylan Walters couldn’t be more grateful for the help.
“I can say that the University of Ghana and SickKids are both grateful for the efforts of International Aid to provide affordable equipment and supplies in a timely manner to our partners in Ghana,” Walters said. “Certainly, without [International Aid’s] experience and efforts, the essential Pediatric Nursing Skills Training Lab at the School of Nursing, University of Ghana would be incomplete.”
Trudy Kernighan, Canadian High Commissioner paid a visit to Ghana on June 23 to support the development of the program. She was ecstatic to see the results of the program underway.
“Simply put, pediatric nurses save children’s lives,” she said.
The Pat Malloy and Trudy Kernighan quotes were taken from articles at these websites:
International Aid helps launch a Ghanaian Nursing Program
