CXC to manage regional nursing examination

Feb 23, 2014 News

– meeting held at Caricom Secretariat to plot way forward

Discussions are apace to ensure that regional nursing education falls under the management of the Caribbean Examinations Council (CXC) during the course of this year. In fact, it is the hope of Chairperson of the Regional Nursing Body, Elnora Warner, that the next sitting of the Regional Nursing Examination in October will be entirely managed by CXC.

Chairperson Elnora Warner

Moreover, extensive discussions in this regard were had during the past week when the body held a three-day meeting for Chief Nursing Officers of Caricom territories at the Caricom Secretariat at Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown.
And according to Warner, who also holds the portfolio of Principal Nursing Officer of Antigua and Barbuda, the meeting was rather productive. She disclosed during an interview with this publication that one of the primary objectives of the meeting was to revise the blueprint that will guide the administration of the regional examination for nursing registration.
This, she noted, is essential to allow for the examination to fall under a new model where it is governed by external examiners – that is, the CXC. However, Warner assured that the examination will remain of the same quality, although it will now have the added benefit of the CXC’s administrative support.
Warner told this publication that the strategic move is being embraced since “the regional nursing examination has become larger than can be managed by our regional Council.”
The meeting was represented by a wide cross-section of Caribbean officials including representatives from various reputable institutions including the University of the West Indies, the Caribbean Nurses Organisation, the University of Belize and the University of Guyana.
“I would say that we were able to achieve a great deal…We have been able to standardise a final practical examination, and this is so that all across the Region we have standardised what should be the component of the final practical examination. This will ensure that a beginning person intending to practice or obtain a licence to practice in the Region, should be able to perform at a certain level,” Warner explained.
Such quality assurance measures, or standardisation practices, Warner said, will in fact seek to improve quality and efficiency in the delivery of health care across the Region.
And according to her, too, it is always imperative that the relevant officials of the Caribbean come together to deliberate on the way forward.
“There is always room for improvement and advancement of nursing in the Caribbean,” said Warner, who is however convinced that nursing is already moving along a path of advancement.
“Nurses are carrying out more expanded roles in the provision of health care and certainly we are seeing more and more of our nurses being trained in specialty areas, as family nurse practitioners, midwives, and even in intensive care training and many other specialisations.” Warner disclosed that although the Caribbean is not yet where it could be, immense efforts are continually being made to improve, such as the implementation of a regional examination for nurses which has been occurring well over 10 years.
“We are now looking to improve on that, in that we are seeking to move it to have it be managed by CXC, and that is mainly to achieve real efficiency and for them to offer more psychometric support in standardising

The Regional nursing body’s meeting in session.

the examination.”
Warner noted it is for this reason that one of the items on the agenda of the meeting was to fine-tune the nursing education path.
The recent meeting at the Caricom Secretariat represented the third consecutive year that the Regional nursing body has held sub-committee meetings here to plot the way forward for region-wide nursing.
And according to Caricom’s Health Sector Development Manager, Dr Rudolph Cummings, Guyana continues to play a pivotal role in hosting crucial meetings that move the process along. This, the former Chief Medical Officer of the Health Ministry said, has been done historically since 1972, and has actually helped with the preparation of nursing examinations, a practice that is expected to remain a fixture.