MoH recruits 4,800 nurses

The Ministry of Health (MoH) has announced the recruitment of 4,799 verified nurses by the Nursing and Midwifery Council in the country.

The new recruits include 1,268 registered midwives, 56 registered community nurses, 507 registered general nurses (psychiatry), 321 health assistants (clinical), 2,389 registered general nurses and 258 community health nurses.

This was contained in a statement which called on all facilities to ensure that staff to be engaged have their documents processed early and placed on the mechanised payroll to enable the Controller and Accountant–General to effect payment of their salaries on time.

The sector minister, Alex Segbefia, in the statement indicated that the current crop of nurses are fortunate because the Ministry of Health is about completing all the seven district hospitals under the NMS Built-To-Care programme, eight district hospitals by Euroget, the Ridge expansion project, the teaching hospitals expansion project and the 1,000 CHPS compounds throughout Ghana.

According to the minister, from 2017, all nurses undergoing training in the various public and private nursing training schools will all be employed in these facilities.

“The ministry is in talks with the Ministry of Finance to secure additional financial clearance which will help engage nurses from private training institutions and other graduate nurses across the country,” he added.

No More Bond

Mr Segbefia further stated that “from the 2017/2018 academic year, new-entrant nursing trainees in government-funded health training institutions will no longer be required to serve a bond after completion.”

He explained that due to the increased numbers of new trainees, many nurses are willing to be employed by the Ministry of Health to be posted to many newly constructed health facilities nationwide.

“Their presence at these basic health facilities will ensure reliable data collection for the Ministry of Health and its development partners,” Mr Segbefia added.