Page 13 - Nursing Education in Malaysia

2/ Historical dEvElopMENt NursiNg iN Malaysia

While the Ministry of Health remained the biggest producer of diploma graduates
at this time, the number of private institutions began to multiply. Currently, there are 70
private colleges, 17 Ministry of Health colleges and three public universities that produce
approximately 12,000 diploma graduates annually. To date, the Ministry of Health colleges
remain the major institutions to conduct postbasic courses in clinical nursing.

Year 1993 marked the beginning of tertiary education for nursing. The first university
programme started in 1993 at the University of Malaya, admitting diploma graduates to
prepare them to become nurse educators and nurse administrators. It was a three-year
programme awarding a Bachelor of Nursing Science (BNSc) with honours. In 2003,
the Quality Assurance Division, Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Higher
Education through a high level committee including a member of the Nursing Board of
Malaysia, developed guidelines in curriculum design for a four-year Bachelor of Nursing
(Honours). Currently, at least eight universities are conducting the four-year curriculum,
six in the public sector – Universiti Malaysia Sarawak (UNIMAS), Universiti Kebangsaan
Malaysia (UKM), Univertsiti Sains Malaysia (USM), Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM),
International Islamic University Malaysia (IIUM), Universiti Teknology MARA (UiTM)
and two in the private sector (International Medical University (IMU) and University
College Sedaya International (UCSI).

With the introduction of the four-year degree programme, the three-year degree
programme of the University of Malaya ceased to exist.

The proposed curriculum is comprehensive yet balanced proportionately between
three major sciences: Basic Medical Sciences, Core Nursing Sciences, Humanities and
Social Sciences. The entry requirements include pure sciences at Sijil Tinggi Pelajaran
Malaysia (STPM) or matriculation level, Mathematics and Bahasa Malaysia at Sijil
Pelajaran Malaysia (SPM) level and Malaysian University English Test (MUET).

These standards and criteria mark the beginning of a true upgrading of nursing
education in Malaysia. The entry requirements have placed nursing at par with other
profesional programmes such as Medicine, Dentistry, Pharmacy or Engineering where the
pure science subjects become the main criteria for admission. The current scenario in
Faculty of Medicine where both nursing and medical students coexist and where sharing of
resources is inevitable, the outcome is not only competitive but also synergistic in nature.

The 21 century also mark the beginning of the establishment of postgraduate
st
programmes in clinical nursing at various public institutions, namely University of Malaya,
UiTM and UKM. The emphasis on postgraduate education in nursing must be clinical to
enable the graduates to use the content and experience as experts in order to teach at the
bachelor’s degree level or to manage an acute care institution.