Ghana’s Ministry of Health in partnership with the Nursing and Midwifery Council has therefore signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) to train 50 Sierra Leonean nurses and midwives in Ghana.

The training forms part of MSF’s strategy to develop the required level of Human Resources for a proposed 160 bed Paediatric and Obstetric Hospital in Kenema, Sierra Leone, which was hard hit during the Ebola outbreak.

A statement issued in Accra by the Registrar, Nursing and Midwifery Council and copied to the Ghana News Agency in Accra on Monday said Korle Bu Teaching Hospital in Accra and the Koforidua General Hospital had been earmarked for the training, which takes off from this month.

The statement said more than 200 health workers from the Kenema District lost their lives during the Ebola epidemic hence the need for the project.

It said Médecins Sans Frontières, selected Ghana based on the country’s international standards of nursing and midwifery education, training and practice and prior to the commencement of the project, a team from Ghana led by the Registrar of Nursing and Midwifery Council went to Sierra Leone in October 2017 to conduct entrance examination and interviews, which facilitated the screening of the prospective trainee nurses and midwives.

The trainees after undergoing the two-year Registered Diploma in Nursing and Midwifery programmes would sit for the Council’s licensing examination in Ghana after which they would graduate and be inducted in Sierra Leone.

The 50 enrolled nurses and midwives have arrived in the country and an inaugural ceremony for the project held.   

MSF is a leading emergency medical humanitarian organisation providing assistance in about 70 countries around the world.

The Nursing and Midwifery Council of Ghana’s mandate is to secure in the public interest the highest standards of training and practice of nursing and midwifery.