The banning of new nursing schools in the Philippines was imposed in 2010 to mitigate the failing compliance of schools with various competency standards set forth by the Professional Regulation Commission (PRC), in addition to the burden of students in paying their affiliations with hospitals. In the midst of the shortage of nurses in the country that was magnified by the COVID-19 pandemic, the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) decided to lift the moratorium. This paper draws on the narratives of nursing leaders and professionals on the phenomenon of nursing shortage and the issues that can arise with the reopening of nursing schools. The verbatims highlight the historical and contemporary entanglement of various issues that contributed to the problem of nursing shortage. In addressing these issues, this paper looks into some of the problems in Philippine nursing that may conform with the broad contemporary problems identified by philosopher Alain Badiou. Viable solutions may be found in the exploration of emerging research methodologies, consideration of systems thinking using technological advances, and incorporating political competency among Filipino nurses.
nursing education ; nursing school

PURPOSE: This study aims to examine how elementary, middle and high school health teachers in Gyeonggi province react to infectious disease like MERS. METHODS: This is a descriptive study using a convenience sample of 1,267 school health teachers. RESULTS: When MERS was an epidemic, school health teachers who took the ‘leading’ role were 92.4%. A school heath teacher's countermeasures against infectious diseases showed a high score during MERS outbreak (3.81) compared to regular days (3.59). CONCLUSION: Based on such results, it has been determined that schools need to keep two types of procedures manual, such as ‘countermeasures on a regular basis’ and ‘countermeasures in the event of a pandemic disease outbreak’ manual in the staff offices so that anyone can view them at any time. It is necessary to prepare regulations to strengthen their authority so that school health teachers can take the role of control tower, in a professional capacity, when communicable disease is spreading. In order to prevent any confusion and chaos, there should be a unitary reporting system at each school when dealing with an epidemic. School health teachers need to get continuous training to reinforce their abilities to react to communicable diseases.
Communicable Diseases ; Coronavirus Infections ; Gyeonggi-do ; Humans ; Pandemics ; School Health Services ; School Nursing ; Social Control, Formal

PURPOSE: This study explores school nurses' emergency care experiences and their needs for systemic institutional support. METHODS: Data were collected in 2016 from the interviews with five focus groups comprising thirty school nurses. Qualitative content analysis was then performed using the collected data. RESULTS: The study found that school nurses were vulnerable to over-reaction in uncertain situations as the school's sole health service provider. The study's findings are divided into ten categories. 1) Major obstacles to overcome as the sole health service provider, 2) Assessing an uncertain situation and making appropriate decisions, 3) Providing limited first aid while maintaining control over the situation, 4) Referring or transferring a student to a hospital that creates tensions and raises cost, 5) Becoming an advocate for information disclosure and treatment, 6) Ensuring follow-up actions and proper transfer of responsibility, 7) Making preparations for future emergency, 8) Responding to conflicts arising from over-reaction as a safeguard and professional expertise, 9) Need for the development of standardized manual for school emergency care, 10) Need for practical case-based training. CONCLUSION: The findings of this study should contribute to the development of the programs aimed at improving school emergency care and the professional competence of school nurse.
Disclosure ; Emergencies* ; Emergency Medical Services* ; Emergency Nursing ; First Aid ; Focus Groups ; Follow-Up Studies ; Health Services ; Humans ; Professional Competence ; Qualitative Research ; School Health Services ; School Nursing

PURPOSE: Recurrent headaches are common among Korean students, causing absences from school or learning impediments. However, most school nurses are unable to provide appropriate diagnosis and treatment as they lack accurate information about the clinical aspects or treatment of headaches. The aim of this study was to investigate school nurses's clinical knowledge, assessment, and management of headache and educational needs in headache management. METHODS: This was a cross-sectional study targeting 250 school nurses who participated in the training lecture hosted by and were working at elementary, middle, and high schools. Surveys with insufficient data were excluded. RESULTS: Participants were 237 school nurses; 122 elementary school nurses, 62 middle school nurses, and 53 high school nurses, with an average age of 42.4±8.8 years. In all, 58.2% of the school nurses responded that they had received headache education, 68.8% responded that they knew the classifications of a headache, and 38.4% responded that they knew a headache assessment method. Only, 29% had a protocol for headache treatment. The educational needs (0-7 points) of school nurses to manage students with headaches were 5.8 for headache knowledge education, 5.5 for acute pharmacotherapy, 5.0 for preventive pharmacotherapy, 6.0 for lifestyle modification, and 6.0 for complementary remedy. CONCLUSION: School nurses had high educational needs for headache management but, they had insufficient knowledge of headaches and had not a protocol for the headache management in most cases. It suggests that headache knowledge education should be performed and the standardized headache management guideline should be developed to improve the performance of school nurses.
Classification ; Cross-Sectional Studies ; Diagnosis ; Disease Management ; Drug Therapy ; Education ; Headache* ; Humans ; Learning ; Life Style ; Methods ; School Nursing

PURPOSE: Recurrent headaches are common among Korean students, causing absences from school or learning impediments. However, most school nurses are unable to provide appropriate diagnosis and treatment as they lack accurate information about the clinical aspects or treatment of headaches. The aim of this study was to investigate school nurses's clinical knowledge, assessment, and management of headache and educational needs in headache management. METHODS: This was a cross-sectional study targeting 250 school nurses who participated in the training lecture hosted by and were working at elementary, middle, and high schools. Surveys with insufficient data were excluded. RESULTS: Participants were 237 school nurses; 122 elementary school nurses, 62 middle school nurses, and 53 high school nurses, with an average age of 42.4±8.8 years. In all, 58.2% of the school nurses responded that they had received headache education, 68.8% responded that they knew the classifications of a headache, and 38.4% responded that they knew a headache assessment method. Only, 29% had a protocol for headache treatment. The educational needs (0-7 points) of school nurses to manage students with headaches were 5.8 for headache knowledge education, 5.5 for acute pharmacotherapy, 5.0 for preventive pharmacotherapy, 6.0 for lifestyle modification, and 6.0 for complementary remedy. CONCLUSION: School nurses had high educational needs for headache management but, they had insufficient knowledge of headaches and had not a protocol for the headache management in most cases. It suggests that headache knowledge education should be performed and the standardized headache management guideline should be developed to improve the performance of school nurses.
Classification ; Cross-Sectional Studies ; Diagnosis ; Disease Management ; Drug Therapy ; Education ; Headache* ; Humans ; Learning ; Life Style ; Methods ; School Nursing

PURPOSE: The purpose of this study was to survey the current status of mental health education and need for mental health education enhancing protective factors in the elementary schools. METHODS: We surveyed 10 school health teachers and 328 fifth- and sixth-grade students using 19- and 20-item questionnaires, respectively. RESULTS: All of the teachers and 65.2% of the students replied that they were either teaching or being taught mental health in school. Topics covered suicide, depression, school violence, and Internet addiction. All of the teachers and 84.1% of the students expressed the need for mental health education enhancing protective factors in school. Both groups replied that two sessions are enough. The teachers preferred role play and discussion as teaching methods, and audiovisual materials and computer as instructional media. The students preferred lecture and role play as teaching methods, and audiovisual materials and smartphone as instructional media. Both groups ranked self-esteem, parent-child relationship, peer relationship, and emotional regulation as the most important topics to be covered in the education. CONCLUSION: There is a high demand for mental health education enhancing protective factors. Therefore, it is recommended to develop educational programs enhancing protective factors by enabling formal and informal learning using smartphone.
Depression ; Education* ; Health Education ; Humans ; Internet ; Learning ; Mental Health* ; Needs Assessment ; Parent-Child Relations ; School Health Services ; School Nursing ; Suicide ; Teaching ; Violence ; Smartphone

PURPOSE: This study was conducted to explore the professional identity of elementary school health teachers. METHODS: In-depth interviews with fifteen elementary school health teachers were conducted from July 2010 to August 2012. Qualitative data collected by the researcher including transcription and field notes were analyzed through an adapted methodology based on the Grounded Theory of Strauss and Corbin. RESULTS: Fifteen categories, 35 sub-categories and 120 concepts were obtained. The key category that was consistently maintained in identity formation was 'keeping themselves being a teacher providing nursing' which has three styles, 'focusing on health education', 'combining nursing and education' and 'focusing on providing nursing care'. CONCLUSION: Results of this study will provide basic information for preparing manuals regarding the range of activities in school health teachers' jobs, improving promotion and merit payment systems for school health teachers, creating support programs for them, and contributing to the formation and establishment of their professional identity.
Nursing ; Professional Role ; Qualitative Research ; School Health Services* ; School Nursing

PURPOSE: The study purposes were to explore school nurses' experience, perceived barriers, and education needs in diabetes management at school. METHODS: This study was a cross sectional study and the study participants were recruited conveniently at continuing education seminars for school nurses at Incheon Metropolitan City. RESULTS: Data for 101 school nurses were analyzed. The nurses were all women and their mean age was 46.9+/-9.3 years. About 66% of them had experience with children with diabetes at school. The school nurses reported that 74.6% of the students tested their blood glucose by themselves, the school clinic was the most common place for blood glucose tests (47.8%) and insulin injections (50.8%) and the nurses knew students' diagnosis through the student health survey (58.2%). About half of the nurses (53.7%) reported that glucagon should be available at school and 49.2% were willing to inject glucagon when necessary. The most frequently reported barrier in diabetes management was role confusion (6.0+/-1.3) and the most common educational need was emergency responses (5.9+/-1.4). CONCLUSIONS: School health policy for diabetes management and diabetes resources are necessary to minimize role confusion of school nurses, improve emergency response, and facilitate health promotion activities in diabetes management.
Adolescent* ; Blood Glucose ; Child* ; Diabetes Mellitus, Type 1 ; Diagnosis ; Disease Management ; Education ; Education, Continuing ; Emergencies ; Female ; Glucagon ; Health Promotion ; Health Surveys ; Humans ; Incheon ; Insulin ; School Health Services ; School Nursing

PURPOSE: To identify current status of university health care program. METHODS: Data and information from homepages of 309 colleges or universities in South Korea were collected. The data was analyzed by frequencies, t-test, chi2 test with SPSS Ver. 18.0. RESULTS: 117(37.9%) universities had organization of health care. Whether university had health care program or not had shown significantly depended on number of students, types of school (university or college), region, and existence of medical and nursing course. Medical course was shown as a strong predictor for facilitating university health care program limitedly focusing on diseases treatment. Health promotion programs have been operated in 15 universities, vaccination programs in 10 universities, and health screening in 20 universities. CONCLUSION: It is strongly recommended to revise the School Health Law for constructing a comprehensive university health care program consolidating health counseling and physical training.
Counseling ; Delivery of Health Care* ; Health Promotion ; Humans ; Jurisprudence ; Korea ; Mass Screening ; Nursing ; School Health Services ; Vaccination

PURPOSE: This study aims to understand the influence of college entrance system-related factors and scores of college scholastic ability test on a first year nursing student's academic achievement. METHODS: Data collected include both a descriptive survey designed to assess college entrance system-related factors with respect to 182 nursing students attending a 4-year nursing college program and their test scores in the first year. The data were analyzed via descriptive statistics, Mann-Whitney U test, Kruskal-Wallis test with Bonferroni's correction, and Spearman's rank correlation coefficient through an SPSS 18.0 program. RESULTS: Student academic achievement with regard to college entrance system-related factors exhibited significant divergence from first year grade point averages (hereafter GPA) and natural science grades. CONCLUSION: This study confirmed the existence of significant differences, depending on the factors regarding the college entrance system. As a result, conducting assessment to evaluate the level of basic knowledge before college entrance is highly recommended. Also recommended is the development of a support program for students projected to have difficulties with respect to their academic achievement.
Education ; Humans ; Natural Science Disciplines ; Nursing ; School Admission Criteria ; Students, Nursing*