Emergency Room Training
Background
Sierra Leone has only 6000 nurses for a population of 8 million people. Numbers of healthcare professionals are slowly increasing since the country was left with no health education infrastructure after the civil war and suffered a further setback with the devastating Ebola epidemic of 2014-16 where many nurses lost their lives. Masanga Hospital and its associated Nursing College are striving to increase the numbers of qualified nurses in the country.
Masanga Emergency Room Training
Professional development of the nursing staff has been a relatively recent focus for Masanga UK. Our first nursing volunteer Emily Bailey arrived in Masanga in 2021 and made an immediate impact in motivating the nurses by providing opportunities for education. Jenny Groen and Imogen Kemp have since continued Emily’s work. In March 2022, Imogen ran the first Emergency Room Training course. This training used materials adapted from the Kings College Sierra Leone Partnership which is delivering nurse training in the capital, Freetown. The training instructs nurses in triage procedures for patients presenting to hospital, as well as the monitoring, assessment and emergency treatment for inpatients on the ward. Specific sessions in burns management, trauma care, communication and leadership were delivered over the 2 and half day programme. Nurses were assessed on completion of the course and received certification if they achieved the preset passmark. Four training courses were completed in 2022 and now 90% of the adult nurses in Masanga have been trained.
Next steps - Training the trainers
Jenny is working with the Hospital Matron Isatu Mansaray to select some Nurse Trainers from existing staff who excelled during the training. These staff will undergo further training with the aim of delivering regular and continuous education to the nurses at Masanga. The trainers will receive salary bonuses on completion of successful delivery of training modules to staff. We believe support for this programme goes a long way in sustainably improving patient care at Masanga.
Interested in Volunteering as a trainer?
We are always looking for volunteers! See our Get Involved page for more details.