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The Ministry of Health and AZP announced several measures to curb the exodus of nursing staff and safeguard care. It was announced that a crisis team has been set up to oversee the measures taken for the Academic Hospital Paramaribo (AZP). Nurses who meet the established criteria will receive a net allowance of SRD 5,000.
Statement from Public Health and AZP
In response to the shortage of specialized medical personnel and capacity constraints in various advanced care/tertiary departments, including those in AZP that provide acute and top clinical (complex and/or expensive care) care, work has been ongoing for some time on various solution models and interventions. Starting in 2023, a “brain drain subsidy” was introduced for medical personnel in consultation with hospitals as one of the measures to curb the outflow of medical personnel. AZP also launched various training courses in 2022, including ICU nursing training, ER, NICU, etc. In addition, Filipino nurses were recruited in the ICU, NICU/Pediatric ICU.
In early 2024, the NICU/PICU units at AZP were so short that the hospital was forced to intervene in February 2024. During this period, nurses from Lands Hospital (LH) and AZP were trained to provide NICU/PICU care through a crash course, and specialized nurses from LH were deployed to the relevant departments. Although these efforts provided some relief, the withdrawal of specialized medical staff increased the pressure and the government was forced to negotiate additional interventions with the hospital. The interventions must be aimed at maintaining tertiary care for the benefit of Surinamese society.
In order to maintain these tertiary care functions, it was decided that:
1. Increase inflow of staff in these key functions:
short term:
a. Internal transfer of nurses from general wards to intensive care units.
b. Deploy qualified nurses from other hospitals (including LH) to AZP.
c. In the final stage the nursing students are deployed to various departments to provide support under the supervision of qualified personnel.
Mid-term:
d. Recruitment of foreign nurses for specific healthcare fields;
e. Deploy medical students, interns, assistant doctors (the so-called seventh year) and newly graduated doctors (the so-called eighth year).
f. Continue to train healthcare professionals through COVAB and AZP.
2. Starting from August 2024, a net monthly allowance of SRD 5,000 will be provided to healthcare workers who meet certain criteria to retain and motivate existing staff. These tertiary care nurses must:
a. Possess a diploma that demonstrates that the individual is authorised and competent to provide nursing care in an acute or top clinical setting (e.g. ICU diploma).
b. and work full-time in a relevant tertiary care department.
The Ministry of Health and the National Hospitals Board (NZR) will discuss implementation of the plan.
3. To reduce the outflow of medical staff and thus protect our hospital care, the following decisions were made:
a. Nursing and related professional qualification certification and registration fee rates will be adjusted.
b. Diplomatic consultations with the Netherlands will take place in the short term, during which the unbridled migration of healthcare providers to (parts of) the Netherlands will be discussed, and the role of recruitment agencies will be discussed.
c. Support will be sought from international organizations such as the Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization for the adoption of international ethical guidelines by WHO member states in the recruitment of health care workers.
The government hopes that these measures will slow down the exodus of staff and maintain the quality of care in acute and top clinical departments in order to continue to provide AZP with the opportunity to serve the community. In this context, a crisis group has been set up, consisting of representatives from the VG, NZR, AZP and the AZP Medical Staff Committee. The main task of this group is to monitor the above measures.
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