In a message sent to the 2nd
International Nursing Congress– Spring 2008, which took place mainly at the
Nursing School of Coimbra, the Special Envoy of the General-Secretariat of the
United Nations for the Fight Against Tuberculosis states that “the progress
already achieved” – in relation to the capacity
of response in terms of training in the medicine, nursing and health
technologies schools - “is not enough for a population with an increasingly
higher life expectancy, but facing several problems and with growing needs in terms of health care”.
More specifically with regard to
nurses, in Portugal the number of nurses is still low when compared to the
European Union”, writes the former Head of State in the message read yesterday
morning after the official opening of the International Nursing Congress
subordinated to the theme (Re) Affirming
Knowledge, the Path to Visibility.
On the other hand, Jorge Sampaio declares that
the admission of professionals from other countries in order to reduce the
scarceness of health technicians represents an “unqualified retrenchment of rights
by frustrating, through the numerus
clausus, the expectations of thousands of youngsters”, which find it
difficult to have access to courses in this area.
Among the several sessions that took place
today, in the round table about “Professional Training and Development –
Objective Paths”, Nurse Lucília Nunes (President of the Nursing Board of the
Portuguese Nursing Council) and Professor Paulo Parente (President of the
Directing Board of the ESEnfC of Porto) disagreed regarding the models of internship
proposed by the Council for access to the profession – one year more than the
four years of the Licentiate Degree.
The 2nd International Nursing Day –
Spring 2008 will last for three days, ending Saturday, 19th April.
These sessions are organised by nurses of the
Hospitals of the
They also have the collaboration of the Portuguese Nursing Council –
Centre.
