Using student nurses ‘no answer’ to shortage

Press, 10 July 1985, Page 8

Using student nurses ‘no answer’ to shortage

Increasing student-nurse intakes at hospitals is no answer to the nursing shortage, says the executive director of the Nurses’ Association, Miss Patricia Carroll. Such a move was a retrograde step and a betrayal of the Government’s commitment to complete 'the transfer of nursing education from hospitals to technical institutes, she said from Wellington yesterdav.

Miss Carroll was commenting on a report that the Minister of Health, Dr Bassett, had given approval for the Auckland Hospital Board to increase its student intake from 60 to 100 for 1986.

“Increasing staffing levels by using unqualified staff may give a false sense of security to the public,” said Miss Carroll. “Greater numbers , of student nurses in hospitals will mean that registered

nurses will be required to supervise, instruct, and spend time explaining to students how and why specific nursing care is given,” she said.

Increasing hospital student intakes was direct exploitation of the nursing shortage. Less . finance would be available for employing registered nurses, who were urgently needed.

Dr Bassett should respond positively to the present

nursing crisis by closing the Auckland Hospital Board School of Nursing and spend the money on employing qualified nurses, said Miss Carroll.

“The change in nursing education has not caused the nursing shortage,” she said. “The real causes are inadequate salaries coupled with a drastic increase in nursing workloads as hospital services become more complex and overloaded.”