Page 14 - Nursing Education in Malaysia

NursiNg EducatioN iN Malaysia

This clinical postgraduate nursing education is seen as another positive milestone for
nursing. Being a practice profession, nursing must be practiced by nurses at all levels.
(The 3 public universities offer Masters of Nursing degrees in: Critical care and Women’s
Health (UiTM); Clinical Specialty (UM); Midwifery, Mental Health, Community Health
and Orthopedics and Traumatology (UKM).

Several private institutions of higher learning, namely MAHSA University College
and Open Universiti Malaysia (OUM) offer nursing-related courses at Masters level.

While nursing education has made an impression in the Malaysian education system,
its nursing service, however, remains static. In hospitals, across the board, the nursing
method used had always been the functional method (evolved from World War II, to
overcome nursing shortage). The method is based on identified functions such as, an
injection nurse, a dressing or medication nurse and so on. Although it is economical, it
could lead to fragmented care and the possibility of overlooking priority patient needs, for
example, patients’ need for counseling, health education, passive exercises, extra fluids,
etc, which are outside of their functional responsibilities, may be missed.

In general, of the four fundamental responsibilities identified within the International
Council of Nurses (ICN) Code of Ethics, only aspects of “restoration of health” and
“alleviation of suffering” might have been covered if only unconsciously; the other two
aspects: “Health promotion” and “Illness prevention” hardly receive much attention, if any,
within hospital nursing.

On the whole, nurses working in the community, in particular Public Health Nurses
are able to cover the four aspects (if only unconsciously) within the scope of maternal and
child health.

The latest development in nursing records the following events:

1. At the end of 2008, there were about 70,000 nurses registered with the Nursing
Board. The nurse-patient ratio was 1:375 where the target by 2015 should be at 1:200
to meet the standards set by Worldf Health Organisation (WHO). There were 17
public colleges of nursing, 10 public universities and 54 private colleges. Together,
they produced 6,000 diploma graduates (2,500 from Ministry of Health and 3,500
from private colleges) (New Sunday Times, 9 November 2008). Six months later
in 2009, the number of private colleges has increased to 70, ie. 16 more in a matter
of months. The number of graduates produced has been doubled (12,162 including
community nurses who are not registered nurses). Currently, there are 109 private
and public institutions offering nursing programmes and among them, 88 offer
diploma programme. By December 2009, there were 83,302 nurses in the country
(New Sunday Times, 26th June, 2010).