THE adequate provision of staff at medical institutions across the country, especially in the hinterland, continues to be addressed by the Ministry of Health, through the implementation of massive training programmes.
“Practically all of the health facilities are satisfied with their complement of graduate doctors. Even though there is always a need for more, services can be maintained at the various facilities,” Minister within the Ministry of Health, Dr. Bheri Ramsaran said, in an interview with the Guyana  Chronicle, last week.
Speaking at his Ministry of Health, Brickdam, Georgetown office, he disclosed that an increasing number of doctors are emerging from the Cuban programme as well as the University of Guyana (UG), which serves to increase the presence of medical personnel at clinics nationwide.
In addition, Ramsaran said, over the past few years, the Ministry has introduced a post graduate programme to train gynaecologists, obstetricians and orthopaedic surgeons and have already graduated a small batch of Guyanese to serve.
About that innovation, he said: “This programme is not a home grown, Third World second rate scheme. It has been done in collaboration with Canadian College of Surgeons and other international universities. Although it is executed locally, there are visiting professors and examiners.”
Ramsaran said 10 persons have since become its graduates and are deployed, from time to time, to render services at hospitals.
“This is an example of professional progression and, at the same time, provision of personnel to man the hospitals,” he stated.
Alluding to the greater number of health workers, Ramsaran revealed that the ongoing massive training programme for nurses is also providing ‘angels in white’, who are trained and adequately prepared to fill hospitals and other health care facilities.
He said: “The Diamond Diagnostic Centre now has a better complement of nurses and, shortly, we will be adding some more there and at other hospitals.”
Minister Ramsaran emphasised that, last year, the Ministry admitted 535 persons to the Nursing Training Programme, 430 in 2008 and 250 in 2007.
“If you add it up, you will see that we have been training about 1,000 nurses in addition to those who are already in the system,” he noted.
“Further, we have already started the specialisation programme for nurses. The Anesthetic Nursing Programme has already been fully established and, a few weeks ago, the first nine nurses graduated and they will be serving in hospitals across the country but, mainly, in Georgetown,” he informed.
According to him, the only setback is that the Ministry has not been able to attract nurses from hinterland communities to receive such training, a situation which is being investigated.
“We are looking at this and have discovered that it is probably due to the unavailability of resources to support themselves during the protracted training,” he said, pointing out that President Bharrat Jagdeo has, particularly, indicated that some support  must be given so that the hospitals that have been built in those communities will have their local complement of nurses.”