The recently appointed Director General and CEO of Samoa’s Ministry of Health says, that it is a blessing in disguise that American Samoa is not pinching nurses from Samoa because they’re short staffed.
Samoa Observer quotes Aiono Dr. Alec Ekeroma, saying that the country needs at least 500 more nurses to achieve full capacity.
Aiono was responding to comments by the CEO of LBJ Hospital, Moefaau Bill Emmsley, who said, they were not hiring Samoan nurses because a review of the nursing curriculum found that is was not comparable to U.S. standards.
“We are short of nurses in Samoa and the fact that they do not recognize our nursing qualification and training, may be a blessing in disguise because it means that they can’t take the few nurses that we have in Samoa,” Aiono said.
Samoa’s current nursing curriculum is acceptable to institutions in Samoa and every country has their own curriculum, he explained.
“At the end of the day, it is not actually where the degree comes from, it is what the people who have the degree actually do with it. So you can have people come from Australia and New Zealand with degrees and not perform in our country.”
He added that nurses are in high demand with nurses going across to Australia for age care.
“American Samoa is a different jurisdiction; they have their own standards, and it is up to them. I know they were talking about sending more of their students to NUS to train in other areas.”
Aiono said, authorities from American Samoa will be visiting to check available training facilities.
