KARACHI: 60 graduates get nursing diploma: MRI dept inaugurated at NICH
By Our Staff Reporter
KARACHI, April 14: Sixty graduates of the School of Nursing were given three-year nursing diploma certificates at a candle-lighting ceremony held at National Institute of Child Health on Saturday.
Taking the oath, the nurses pledged to serve the ailing community irrespective of their cast, creed and social status. Half of the graduates of 2005 and 2006 batches had already been employed at the NICH, said a senior nursing superintendent.
Federal Health Minister Nasir Khan, who was the chief guest at the ceremony, announced Rs15,000 cash prizes for two distinguished graduates, Seemi Akhtar and Shumaila Joseph, who secured top positions in the nursing board’s exam.
The minister said nursing was a noble profession and it should be ensured that nurses were given due respect and dignity at all levels, within the premises they served and in the society where they moved. He said the country should produce more nursing graduates since demand for nurses was tremendous within the country and abroad. With the changing facets of medical profession, now the nurses are required not only to be smart and confident but also needed to remain update in their field, he added.
He said the government was focussing on the professional advancement of doctors and nurses, including opportunities for undertaking research works. The health budget at federal level was Rs12 billion in addition to another about six billion rupees dedicated for prevention of blindness and hepatitis and other projects, he noted.
Responding to a demand of NICH Director Dr Afroze Ramzan Sherali, he said funds for research and specialised training were available with the government and the ministry would welcome projects from junior doctors and nurses of the NICH as well.
Earlier, the minister inaugurated the MRI department and renovated operation theatre at the NICH.
In her speech, Dr Afroze said the MRI facility, developed at a cost of Rs62 million, was the first of its kind in public sector hospital run by the federal government. She said the MRI facility would certainly help diagnose diseases in children coming from rural and urban areas of Sindh and from adjacent areas of Balochistan and Punjab.
She said future plans of the NICH included new pulmonology unit, gastroenterology unit and a state-of-the-art pathology department besides upgrading the nursing school to offer courses for BSc nursing and paediatrics. The government had already approved these projects, which would cost around Rs120 million, she said.
She informed the minister that the number of patients visiting the institute was increasing every year. In 2006, there were 270,000 visits and 12,000 operations at the institute having a bed strength increased to 475, she added, saying that in order to meet the needs of sick children staff strength would have to be increased.
Later, she told the newsmen that the plan was under consideration to provide free of cost MRI facility to the admitted patients.
