How to grow your own nurses

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‘We realized that our staff must be our most important asset and that we would need to invest in their training and development if we wanted to retain our current staff and attract new members,’ says former nurse Liesl Strauss, now Deputy Director Human Resource Management at the 235-bed hospital.

Since the inception of the project, 90 people recruited from the surrounding communities have become nurses, 12 cleaners have become auxiliary (assistant) nurses, while 36 nurses have completed an additional year of training and 32 others have completed an additional two years of training and can now register as professional nurses.

The hospital has managed to fill all its lower and mid-level nursing posts with graduates from its programme and is only short of eight professional nurses (8% vacancy rate). Other hospitals in the Western Cape have an average vacancy rate of 35%, while professional nurses are in short supply countrywide.

The learnership programme has given unemployed people, many living in informal settlements and isolated rural areas, the opportunity to gain a formal nursing qualification and uplift their families and communities.

Farm labourers with a good matric have also been recruited and trained, many of them now professional nurses.

‘They don’t want to leave. They are earning a fantastic salary in comparison to what they were earning in the past. They have an absolute career path and they are often able to uplift their dependants from a life of poverty,’ says Strauss.

Joyce September qualified as an auxiliary nurse last year. Raised by her extended family in Zweletemba, an informal settlement outside Worcester, September had firsthand experience of the health sector when her physically and mentally disabled child died eight years after first contracting TB meningitis.

‘During her visits to the hospital she developed a love for nursing,’ says Strauss, who says September has all the attributes to be an excellent nurse.

‘She overcame her adversity and fulfilled her dream,’ adds Strauss.

Another recruit Cyprian Vena completed his auxiliary nurse training in 2003 and his staff nurse training three years later. He has now been awarded a bursary which will enable him to study towards becoming a professional nurse.

Raised in Ekuphumleni, an informal settlement outside De Doorns, Vena was recruited from an community with one of the highest unemployment rates in the Western Cape.

‘He has excelled under extremely difficult social circumstances,’ says Strauss.

In accordance with the project’s ‘step ladder’ approach, new recruits undergo one year of training before being appointed as an auxiliary nurse. The new recruits receive an allowance while on their first year learnership.

This is followed by another year of training to qualify as a staff nurse and a further two years to be appointed as a professional nurse ‘ a precious commodity in the healthcare sector.

Learners get their practical training at their district hospitals so they don’t have to leave their community to go to academic hospitals in urban areas, as is usually the case.

Strauss points out that their current drop-out rate is zero percent while the national figure is 40%.

‘Our statistics have shown that most professional nursing staff trained at Eben Donges do not leave to work overseas because of their loyalty to the hospital and community. Other categories also opt to stay because they have an opportunity to study further,’ Strauss points out.

Exit interviews conducted by Strauss indicate that those few that have gone overseas return after a year or two. ‘Their main motivation is to explore the world and make some money, quickly,’ explains Strauss.

Others have resigned because family commitments do not allow them to work nightshift or because of the unbearable pressure on nurses to cope with the patient loads. Another reason for the increased pressure on nurses is the lack of role models and mentors due to more experienced nurses joining the brain drain.

The Eben Donges model is currently being shared with other roleplayers in the province and the hospital is already the training provider for the West Coast Winelands region.

The learnership project received an Impumelelo Award last year for the innovative work it is doing and specifically for the partnership it was able to form between the hospital, the education department, various communities and the Health and Welfare Sector Education Authority.