Just over 100 specialist nurses from the Republic of Ghana arrived in Barbados early on Monday morning to bolster the island’s national nursing numbers.Speaking to the press on the nurses’ arrival at the Grantley Adams International Airport, Executive Chairman of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital (QEH) Juliette Bynoe-Sutherland said the hospital will benefit from the expertise of a large portion of the nurses who will be on a two-year contract. Just over 60 of the remaining nurses will be utilised in other areas of the health sector.“We are expecting 56 nurses from Ghana to join the Queen Elizabeth Hospital and 66 to join the agencies of the Ministry of Health: that is the Geriatric Hospital, Psychiatric Hospital, and the polyclinic system. They are nurses with all areas of specialisation who were recruited specially to join us here in Barbados. All of them have specialist qualifications.“They join us at a time where our need for nursing continues to be great. We are doing our best nationally to ensure that we can increase the number of nurses from the Barbados Community College (BCC). In all of our institutions we have enhanced our retention programmes for the nurses here in Barbados, however, like many hospitals globally, we are facing nursing shortages.”
