PUNCH
The President of the National Association of Nigeria Nurses and Midwives, Michael Nnachi, tells LARA ADEJORO why the association does not recognise auxiliary nurses, in view of the arrest of a suspect who was said to have administered an injection on a musical artiste, Ilerioluwa Aloba, popularly known as Mohbad, before he died.
Some Nigerians find it hard to distinguish between a registered nurse and an auxiliary nurse when seeking medical care. How are these connected or unconnected to the nursing profession?
A registered nurse refers to a person who has undergone professional training to become a nurse. Even before entering into an institution, the person must be qualified, and the qualification has to do with having an O’level certificate that must include English Language, Mathematics, Physics, and Biology in not more than two sittings. We have the basic nursing training which is run in a school of nursing, and through the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board examination, you can study it in the university. Whichever way, you must have the O’level qualification. That one is compulsory because, without it, you are going nowhere, and if you take the JAMB examination, you must pass it if you want to be offered admission. You need to get it right that if you are talking about auxiliary nurses, all these things I am telling you do not apply at all. So, it is not even necessary to compare the two.
An auxiliary (nurse) has nothing to do with professional nurses; they are incomparable. They are two things that do not match at all. It is an erroneous assumption that everybody in a white uniform is a nurse; it can be assumed by any individual. It is like going to the hospital and saying that everybody in a white (uniform) is a nurse when you may not know that some of them are dieticians. You should not conclude that anybody who wears a white (uniform) is a nurse; that is a misnomer. The basic truth is that a professional nurse and an auxiliary cannot be compared.
Who certifies a person as a professional nurse?
Once a nurse has passed through the tutelage of education in a nursing institution and has professional qualifications, a regulatory body such as the Nursing and Midwifery Council of Nigeria needs to certify such an individual through professional examination where competency will be proved, and the person has to be qualified before they are registered and licensed. And then before they get to that level, they must have spent three years doing basic nursing. In a university, it takes five years before a person can get a certificate as a degree holder in Nursing Science, and when you see such a person in the hospital, you will know that they are professional nurses because of the areas of operation, disposition, and care. You cannot compare an auxiliary and a professional nurse.
Why then are auxiliary nurses prevalent in the country?
