Super nurses, not super maids!

Pretty sure a lot of youngbloods would rejoice at the thought of the Philippine government, through the Department of Education, getting serious at promoting vocational education, including nurses.

For while it is true that the Philippines still ranks first as supplier of nurses to the United States, the country is still unable to fill in the demand for vocational or practical nurses, to be specific. And that's plain truth! This according to Gregory Tyrone Howard who was here for the commencement exercise of the first forty practical nursing graduates of the Philippine Paramedical and Technical School-Cebu campus.

Prior to the graduation rites, Howard who is president of the National Federation of Licensed Practical Nurses of America and chairman of the Commission on Graduates of Foreign Nursing Schools-Licensed Practical Nursing Standards Committee met the press in a conference at the Cebu Country Club. In his Power Point presentation dubbed "New Concept: Supply, Demand and Use of Licensed Practical Nurses", he cited that 30.2 percent of nurses working in the US today are from the Philippines, but that these are registered nurses only.

And that while there were entities serious to provide training and assistance in employment opportunities, there was an experienced slight decline among the number of applicants in 2005 as compared to over a hundred LPN applicants in the previous year for the sad state of LPNs not being recognized by the Philippine Nurses Act.

"The Philippine government gives very little focus on the ladderized nursing program in here, nor has ignited the desire for students to take up vocational nursing," Howard said.

"The Nurses Act in your country has always worked in favor of those who take up the four-year course. This is very evident in the VisaScreen Applications by Profession from 1998-2005 over at www.cgfns.org which states that 76,776 registered nurses had applied as against only 371 practical or vocational nurses.

"And then they travel to the US and work there only to realize that nurses for bedside care are the ones really in demand in the US - those trained to give 100 percent attention to terminally ill patients or those on life support systems, on nursing's clinical component," he pointed out.

Howard underlined that "it is such a waste for your workforce to never ever exploit potentials to the maximum when you are highly skilled. I noticed that in the PPTS-Iloilo campus for example, practical nursing students demonstrate competency and efficiency in their service despite being clipped by limited access to technology."

And added, "licensed practical nurses are in demand in the hospitals in the US, like in Louisiana for example, but a few Filipinos are hired to fill in the position."

There is a demand ratio of 1:6 for licensed practical or vocational nurses under the direction of one registered nurse, he stressed.

LPNs are nurses who undergo 12 to 18 months rigorous training in patient care and assist the registered nurses, who supervise the nursing shifts and sections. In the Philippines, their closest equivalent are nursing aides, who are trained by their respective hospitals based on internal needs.

Meanwhile, Engr. Arturo "Art" Lacuesta, founder and president of PPTS-Davao campus explained that the Philippines sends a few LPNs to the US because there is no common standard for such training in the country.

"It would be very nice if we could work together to drumbeat the government so to make a revision on the current Nurses Act, to include provisions for the development of the ladderized nursing program, create community awareness of the advantages/gains of vocational nursing, or to push for a separate legislation that would value practical nursing education," Lacuesta said.

Further, Lacuesta expressed laments that LPNs are not recognized here for non-inclusion to the Nurses Act. It was also learned from him that the standard that the Technical Education Skills and Development Authority utilizes does not conform with the US standard.

"Our job description here for LPNs does not match that of the US. Some institutions here even consider our LPNs nursing aides, which is unfair. How can the LPN applicants get recognized in the US if even the government here is not convinced of the viability of this endeavor?" he posed this question.

In a wrap-up, Mr. Jose Jake Marques, PPTS-Cebu campus director, said that since 2004 they have already been lobbying for the government to include LPNs in the Philippine Nurses Act, but "seemingly to no avail". In fact, he added that there is already a pending bill for such concern, but "it doesn't seem to prosper."

"We have the option. Instead of producing 'super maids', why don't we produce super nurses? Imagine the market of LPNs that we can provide," Marques expressed.

With the political stew boiling to the fuels of the looming polls in May 2007, will there ever be a legislator who might be interested to review the Philippine Nurses Act and study the value of ladderized nursing education program or vocational courses for nursing as part of his/her platform? And how would you think our senatoriables treat the need to introduce US-approved practical nursing programs in vocational and paramedical schools here? More so, get serious with healing wounded souls by passing on the dignity of a profession Florence Nightingale had espoused - train super nurses, not super maids!

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