The Nursing and Midwifery Council of Ghana (N&MC), on Monday December 2, 2019, received a two-member delegation from the Nursing and Midwifery Council of The Gambia.
The Gambian delegation was led by Mr. Mafugi Bojang, Registrar of the Council and accompanied by his Deputy Registrar, Mr. Alasana Darboe.
Mr. Darboe noted that the visit formed part of the efforts of The Gambia to restructure and transform the nursing and midwifery education, training and practice.
He said their visit offered them the opportunity to understudy N&MC’s licensing examination structure with particular interest in the online licensing examination which Ghana has been touted as the first in Africa to introduce online examination in the training and education of nursing and midwifery profession.
Other areas of interest included the ongoing reforms in the areas of indexing, registration, accreditation and the success stories of the Council.
According to Mr. Mafugi Bojang, Registrar of the Nursing and Midwifery Council in The Gambia, they chose to understudy Ghana due to the overwhelming credibility and integrity of the country’s robust regulatory system for the training, education and practice of nursing and midwifery.
Receiving the delegation on behalf of the 14th Governing Board, the Registrar, Management and Staff of the Council, Mrs. Philomina Woolley, Deputy Registrar in charge of Operations at the N&MC with the assistance of some senior officers, took the delegation through series of presentations and discussions on the Council’s mandate, change management processes of the online licensing examination, digitization of the indexing process, renewal of license to practice and the general operations of the Council.
Mrs. Woolley disclosed that with the implementation of the online licensing examination which commenced in September 2018, 374 Registered Mental Health Nurses from three training institutions were the first to sit for the online licensing examination.
She added that “currently close to 8,000 nursing and midwifery candidates have taken licensing examination in Registered Mental Health Nursing, Registered Community Nursing, Registered Midwifery, Post NAC/NAP Midwifery, Peri-Operative Nursing, Ophthalmic Nursing, Critical Care Nursing, Public Health Nursing and Ear, Nose and Throat Nursing.”
It is the expectation that in the year 2020, the Registered General Nursing and Registered Nurse Assistants (Clinical/Preventive) programmes will be rolled on to make the entire conduct of the licensing examination by the Council fully digitized.
Explaining the success of the implementation of the online licensing examination, Mrs. Woolley explained that prior to its implementation, the Council took time to engage the various training institutions in an intensive education on the mode of operation of the online exams, and further conducted mock exercises to prepare the candidates psychologically by giving them a prior exposure to the computers and the new mode of examination, before the main exams was conducted.
“In November 2017 the Council received support for the development and implementation of the online licensing project from the Netherlands Embassy through its Capacity Development in Higher Education programme initiative (NICHE) and The Netherland Universities Foundation for International Cooperation (NUFFIC),” she said.
She told the team that the Council is implementing the project in partnership with a consortium comprising CINOP Global and the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology.
The Gambian delegation was highly impressed with the delivery by the Council and recommended the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Ghana to assist them to restructure and transform the nursing and midwifery regulatory system. According to the delegation, they were ever ready to understudy and implement the transformational models and initiatives introduced by the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Ghana.
Mrs. Woolley also assured the delegation that, N&MC was prepared for cooperation, collaboration and that it will assist in the restructuring and transformation of the nursing and midwifery regulatory system and operations in The Gambia.
This visit follows study tours from many other countries including Uganda, Malawi, Tanzania, Liberia and Ethiopia who have underscored Ghana’s growing international recognition in nursing and midwifery regulation.
International countries such as Barbados, Germany, United Kingdom, and Jamaica among others have greatly expressed interest in engaging the services of Ghanaian nursing and midwifery practitioners.
The delegation also visited the school of Nursing and Midwifery at the University of Ghana, Legon and the Nursing and Midwifery Training School in Koforidua to acquaint themselves with the various courses being taught in the training institutions.
They toured some interesting places in Accra before their departure.