NARH-BITA COLLEGE HOLDS MATRICULATION (PAGE 18,, JAN 11, 2011)

THE Narh-Bita College of Nursing, in the port city of Tema, has held its seventh joint matriculation and graduation ceremony with a renewed pledge by the College Board to make the institution a centre of excellence in West Africa for the training of nurses.
The college was the first private nursing training institution in Ghana to be accredited by the National Accreditation Board.
It runs the three-year Registered General Nursing Diploma, the Health Assistants Clinical certificate and the Medical Laboratory Technicians certificate programmes.
The college is engaged in tropical nursing research collaboration and student and staff exchange programmes with Crest University, Pennsylvania, USA, Teesside University, Middlesborough, UK, Harstead University in Norway and the Metropolitan University College, Copenhagen, Denmark.
Students of the college have access to practical training in government hospitals but the Narh-Bita Hospital, which provides services to over 80,000 patients in the Tema metropolis annually and which serves more than 60 corporate clients in the port city, provides additional excellent facilities for the practical training of students of the college.
The hospital also runs the only private neurosurgical centre in the country, where spine and brain surgery are performed in addition to diagnosis, treatment and research into neurotic diseases.
In recognition of its performance, the medical facility received accreditation from the West Africa College of Physicians in 1998, making it the first private hospital in Ghana to provide postgraduate training for doctors in Family Practice.
Several rural communities have benefited from the annual Students and Staff Medical Outreach Programme of the Narh-Bita College of Nursing. Communities which benefit from medical aid under the college’s outreach programme are typically poor communities lacking basic amenities such as schools, potable water supply and health facilities.
Under the programme, teams of medical staff and students from the school treat the people of such communities for malaria, anaemia, bilharzia, scabies, intestinal worm infestations, eye diseases and other medical conditions prevalent in rural communities. Cases requiring specialist consultations are referred to hospitals.
The hospital is affiliated to several local and international organisations in a bid to keep abreast of the current and emerging trends in medical practice. These have impacted positively on the quality of training students of the nursing college receive.
The college has a well-stocked library with titles covering subjects like anatomy, physiology, medical and surgical nursing, with supplementary teaching and learning materials in the form of CD-ROMS and video tapes. All computers of the college are connected to the Internet.
At the joint ceremony last week, 68 students graduated and 230 students were matriculated.
Miss Victoria Nartey received three awards for excellence — the overall best Medical Laboratory Technician student award and an award each for being the best student in Haematology and Clinical Chemistry respectively during the academic year.
Mr Isaac Asiamah was presented with an award for being the overall best student of the academic year and a second award for being the best student in Clinical Anatomy.
In his address at the ceremony, the President of the college, Dr Edward A. Narh, called for a radical review of the programme for the practical training of students of private nursing training institutions in the country.
Under the prevailing system for the practical training of students of private nurses training institutions, the students are charged fees for their practical attachment in public hospitals.
Dr Narh said the Ministry of Health needed to support the practical training of students from private nurses training institutions by cancelling the payment of fees by the students on practical attachment in public medical facilities.
He noted that during their practical attachment, nursing students from private training institutions contributed significantly to the provision of medical care and it was therefore unfair to charge them training fees.
“Nursing students already pay high fees for their training in private institutions and to charge them fees for their practical attachment in public hospitals is a financial burden on the students,” Dr Narh said.
He said since most products of private nursing training institutions in the country ended up working in the public hospitals, the Ministry of Health should have an interest in their training.
The President of the college said since the public health delivery system benefited immensely from the training of nurses by private training institutions, the government also needed, as a matter of urgency, to find a way of assisting the private training institutions to access funding from financial and other institutions for the development of infrastructure and the provision of adequate equipment and materials for the training of nurses .
Students of the Adom Medical Laboratory Technicians Training School in Tema, which is one of the training institutions under the Narh-Bita Group of training institutions, also needed to benefit from fee-free practical training programmes in government hospitals, Dr Narh said.
He said the government could contribute further towards the training of highly qualified nurses for the country’s hospitals and clinics by supporting programmes for the further training of the graduates of private nursing training institutions up to the Master’s degree level.
Present at the ceremony were Mr Rojo Mettle-Nunoo, Deputy Minister of Health, the Tema Mantse, Nii Adjei Krakue II, Professor Korsah and Professor Afari, both members of the College Council, and Dr Appiah Denkyira, Director of Health Services.