Indonesian nurses need a proper management system: Survey

Indonesian nurses need a proper management system: Survey

Sari P. Setiogi
The Jakarta Post
Jakarta

Indonesian nurses need better management systems and more
education to improve both their knowledge and service, according
to a survey jointly conducted by the World Health Organization
(WHO) and the Ministry of Health.

"(For) the research -- we actually interviewed nearly a
thousand people (nurses) from all levels of the district of
health system -- and everybody was offering ways to improve
through all the regencies and provinces," a WHO consultant on
nursing and midwifery, Deborah Hennessy, told The Jakarta Post at
the sidelines of the International Nursing Conference 2003 here
on Friday.

"Everybody needs to know exactly what they are expected to do
and have to do it well. And evaluating the quality is actually by
monitoring ... and encourage people, give good feedback and help
them if they are not achieving that standard. That's the
management's responsibility," she said.

Indonesian nurses generally work without good management, with
the result that they rarely improve their knowledge or skills.

For example, Budi Anna Keliat, the chairperson of the
conference's organizing committee, said that in the mental
hospital Marzuki Mahdi, Bogor, West Java, the average length of
treatment was 115 days.

"After a practical model management on professional nursery
under the International Standard Organization (ISO) was adopted
there, treatment was reduced to 13 days or 14 days for a similar
result," she said, "It is a big saving for patients and they are
happy with that."

Most nurses actually wanted to change, said Hennessy, but as
she found through the research that they did not know how to do
it.

"We need to change the system but for a big country like this
(Indonesia), it takes time," she said.

Dean of the Nursing School at the University of Indonesia Elly
Nurachmah T. said she was concerned over the quality of nurses
and midwives in the country.

"Nurses should give humane and holistic care to their
patients, including their physical, psychological and spiritual
conditions as well as their cultural background," she said.

She said that within a pluralistic society, particular
approaches would be necessary to treat patients according to
their own habits and culture, "And it will have positive impacts
for their recovery time."

She, however, said the fact that 75.65 percent of Indonesian
nurses had graduated from nursing schools (SPK) which were
equivalent to high school, was also of a great concern because
that is below international standards, in which an undergraduate
degree is the minimum requirement.

Out of a total of 180,000 nurses, only about 4,200 nurses have
an undergraduate degree, leaving Indonesia behind other countries
in the region which have more educated nurses.

"What's more is that nurses who have obtained their
undergraduate degrees are hired for managerial tasks, instead of
serving patients," said Elly.