Over 170 nurses graduate from KNH

More than 170 nurses have graduated from the Kenyatta National Hospital School of nursing.

This gives a boost to the medical field which has been hit with a shortage of healthcare workers, way below the World Health Organisation requirement.

The 170 were conferred with Higher Diplomas and Certificates in six speciality areas of Critical Care, Perioperative, Nephrology, Accident and Emergency, Oncology and Neonatal Nursing.

“More specialized nurses are required to help realize efforts by the government and ministry of health to help communities access specialized nursing,” School of Nursing Principal Jane Chore said.

The KNH school of nursing has trained 1,740 specialized nurses since its inception in 1996.

Nursing Council of Kenya registrar representative Dr Gladys Machira who was the Chief Guest congratulated the school for the big role they are playing in building capacity in the Nursing profession.

“As the Council, we are satisfied that the School has prepared the graduands to contribute to the health sector both locally and beyond the borders,” she said.

A new WHO analysis released in June shows Kenya is among the top six countries in Africa with the highest concentration of health workers.

However, Kenya still does not meet the WHO health worker-to-population ratio.

The country has in the last 10 years established medical training colleges in 44 of the 47 counties.

The study, titled “The health workforce status in the WHO African Region: findings of a cross-sectional study”, was published this week in the British Medical Journal Global Health.

The study surveying 47 African countries finds that Africa has a ratio of 1.55 health workers (physicians, nurses and midwives) per 1000 people.

This is below the WHO threshold density of 4.45 health workers per 1,000 people needed to deliver essential health services and achieve universal health coverage.

“The KNH management will support the school in its endeavour to churn out qualified specialized nurses into the labour market,” Acting KNH CEO Dr Irene Inwani said.

It is projected that the shortage of health workers in Africa will reach 6.1 million by 2030, a 45 per cent increase from 2013, the last time projections were estimated.