Students of Batch 42 at the SVG School of Nursing bring an Era to a Close

by Donald De Riggs.

In the history of the St Vincent & the Grenadines School of Nursing, Batch 42, could be considered the final chapter of an interesting journey that prepared many a young woman and man for a career in health care delivery, training that earned them the title, RN or Registered Nurse.

But a new era has dawned and future graduates from the School of Nursing now called the Division of Nursing Education – DNE, will earn a bachelor of science degree in Nursing.

The RN program is a three-year program which is recognized as an Associate Degree, much like the QAT title afforded to Teachers graduating from Teachers College. The last course of the local Nursing program has always been Mass Casualty Management (MCM) facilitated and enhanced by wireless communications. The MCM course will not be offered as part of the curriculum of the bachelors in nurshing degree.

The MCM/Emcoms (Emergency Communications) course has always been facilitated by the Rainbow Radio League Inc. and focused on a multiplicity of possible hazards that could create a mass casualty scenario. The scenarios ranged from accidents at sea, on land, fires, earthquakes, hurricanes, terrorist and chemical attacks, hiker accidents, there was never a repeat of scenario save one, the very last one. On this occasion the student nurses had to respond to a riverine accident in the Wallilabou area which they executed with record time management.

After getting a report that there was a flash flood and that river bathers had been washed away, the response team covering a distance of nearly one mile on foot, found, stabilized and transported the victims by stretcher over a similar distance to an advanced medical post in a record 44 minutes. On this occasion, team work enabled the completion of the tasks in record time.

As is customary, following the training activity, an evaluation was conducted to identify areas for improvement as well as commending the participants for executing their duties efficiently.

Thanks were extended to DNE Lecturer and MCM course director Hilton James. Also on hand were evaluators from NEMO as well as SSU members who among other things provided security during the outing.

Rainbow Radio League Inc. Director Donald De Riggs – J88CD, has been the main Emcoms facilitator/guest lecturer for the MCM course. In 2020, the RRL is celebrating its 25th anniversary of service to SVG and the wider Caribbean.