Page 31 - Nursing Education in Malaysia

3/ tHE status of NursiNg iN Malaysia

Nurse candidates must pass the licensure examination conducted by the Nursing Board
of Malaysia, regardless of educational preparation. The licensure examination provides a
standardized minimum knowledge base for nurses. After passing the initial examination,
nurses have to maintain an Annual Practicing Certificate (APC) through ongoing continuing
education and clinical or administrative practice for a minimum fee paid by their respective
employers.

Nurses’ roles and responsibilities
In the past, a nurse’s principal role was to provide care and comfort to ill clients.
However, changes in nursing have expanded the profesional nursing role to include increased
emphasis on health promotion and illness prevention, as well as concern for the client as
st
a whole. Currently, in the 21 Century, the emphasis is not just about managing illness it
is also about managing health of the community and the environment. The emphasis is on
wellness as well as the health of population and the environment in order to enhance the
quality of life.

Nursing has to respond to these multiple changes and challenges. Firstly, demographic
changes influence the population’s health and healthcare. Other aspects include rural to
urban shift; increase life span; higher incidence of chronic, long-term illness; and increased
incidence of cancers, alcoholism, drug addiction, HIV/AIDS, etc – all will affect nursing
practice, nursing education and nursing standards.

Accordingly, the role of nurses will change drastically. They have to be multiskilled
and versatile caregivers; be a client advocate where they need to protect clients’ legal rights,
to provide additional information to help clients make decisions and to be culturally and
religion sensitive at all times; be good in client teaching and health education; be excellent
communicators to promote nurse-client relationship to meet the need of individuals, families
and communities; and last but not least be a good manager of care activities to establish an
environment for collaborative care to provide quality care and good client outcomes.

Basic requirements to practice nursing
Nursing is a knowledge-based profession. The core competence of nursing is
critical thinking and the intelligent application of knowledge to practice. These are basic
requirements because:

(a) Nurses use critical thinking to collect and interpret information and make sound
judgement that contribute to good decisions, and that in many instances, these
decisions involve the patients’ well-being, even their survival;

(b) Everyday nurses are expected to link, synthesize and coordinate the work output
of multidisciplinary team comprising doctors and other healthcare professionals.
To this end, nurses are expected to possess the knowledge and skills to perform
as coordinators of care;

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