KOTA KINABALU: Nursing students at Aseana College of Health Science (Aseana College) are encouraged to be more adventurous and seek opportunities overseas.
Aseana College chief executive officer Gopalan Suresh Kumar said countries like the United Kingdom, Australia and Singapore and a few other countries require nurses.
“With the new international realities of migration, advance in communication technology and worldwide nursing shortage, educating and preparing a diverse nursing workforce have become a critical priority.
“That is why Aseana College decided to open one campus in Kota Kinabalu,” he said.
“I take this opportunity to tell our students that there is a world of opportunity out there,” said Kumar during his speech at the International Nurses Day 2012 celebrations at Aseana College in Sembulan yesterday.
With the theme ‘Closing The Gap: From Evidence to Action’, Kumar said nurses must constantly strive to use evidence-based approaches to nursing services.
Health system today throughout the world is being challenged by inequities in quality and quantity of services and by reduced financial resources, he said.
The use of evidence to inform the actions is a critical and achievable way to improve health system performance, he said.
Kumar said International Council of Nurses believes that nurses are well placed to supply important information about context; about different system, population group needs and the role of local politics and social factors.
Meanwhile, Aseana College programme manager Helen Chiang said nurses must go into research to have evidence-based data to implement and strengthen patient’s care by shown evidence.
Various activities such as blood donation drive, thallasemia screening for students, new voter registration and morning assembly were held to celebrate the occasion.
Aseana College Kota Kinabalu, with 700 students at the moment and 10 government hospitals as partners for industrial training, is offering a three-year Diploma in Nursing Programm and will open registration for its new intake next month.