PUTRAJAYA: The Health Ministry (MoH) will ensure that only trained and quality foreign nurses are allowed to work in the country, says Deputy Health Minister Datuk Lukanisman Awang Sauni.
Currently, Lukanisman said, foreign nurses are usually sourced from India, Sri Lanka, the Philippines and Indonesia, and they have to pass the "Malaysian Nursing Board Qualification Examination for Foreign Trained Nurses".
"The ministry does not want to accept unqualified nurses. So far, the nurses we have accepted are from India, Sri Lanka, the Philippines and Indonesia," he said after the 2024 International Nurses Day celebration here today.
This year's theme was "Our Nurses. Our Future. Powering Healthcare Economics". The event was attended by 1,250 government and private hospital nurses, in which three of their outstanding peers were presented with awards.
Sapiah Abdul Hadi won the Service Figure Award, Catherine Pero received the Education Figure Award and S. Kalyani was honoured with the Community Service Figure Award.
Lukanisman said that as of last October, only 101 foreign nurses had passed the MoH's screening to work in private hospitals in the country.
"The number of individuals is not significant because we have set a strict criteria for recruitment," he said.
Earlier in his speech, Lukanisman said the country provides nearly 139,000 manpower in the nursing field.
"Under MoH, we have nearly 75,000 nurses, with the rest in the private sector. That is a considerable number and a crucial pillar in MoH's structure and system," he said.
He said MoH was training nurses with a more robust digital system through the use of electronic medical records (EMR).
"It requires knowledge and mental preparedness based on the introduced policy. The ministry's leadership will always be vigilant about issues at the grassroots level in all facilities," he said.
Last September, former Health Minister Dr Zaliha Mustafa announced temporary conditional relaxation for private healthcare facilities to hire trained foreign nurses for a period of 12 months starting from Oct 1.
Dr Zaliha said that the shortage of nursing staff in both the public and private sectors had a significant impact on the effective delivery of healthcare services in the country, and this had long been raised by various associations in the private medical industry network.
She said the hiring of trained foreign nurses could not exceed 40 per cent in each facility and was valid for only 12 months until Sept 30 this year.
However, service extension would be allowed for another 12 months, but it must follow the approval of Temporary Practice Certification (TPC) for trained foreign nurses.