CHED orders 561 Clinical RLE hrs to BSN Degree

suzanne4, RN · May 23, 2008

Thanks for posting this, but has to laugh when I read it.

Reason being is that so many of the newbie nurses from the Philippines brag about being the best nurses in the world. This reputation is from the older nurses that came to the US more than twenty years ago and their programs were all 5 years. And they were required to do about 50 deliveries before they completed their program, not the five that you see now and not of how many actually do those or get it signed off only.

And that is when the reputation was started, not with the programs that are in place now and with such a poor passing rate after attending school for a full program, then they should be closing down schools instead of increasing the number of them as well as students.

woknblues · May 25, 2008

" PNA president Leah Paquiz, however, admitted that students need to study more because of the low passing rate in the past Nursing Licensure Examinations (NLE).

"Actually, [the four--year curriculum] being implemented at present is enough. The [present curriculum] actually has two summer classes that could be counted as one full year," Paquiz told ABS-CBN's morning show, "Umagang Kay Ganda."

Paquiz, however, noted that nursing students should work double-time because of the low passing rate in the NLE

"The students need to study more because if you've noticed, the passing rate for the board exams hasn't reached 50 percent," she said."

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The chicken and the egg argument to be sure, but I think it is funny that they could actually lay the entire blame on the students. How about the institutions that churn out students from 1st- 4th years with 99% getting their diplomas? What is that piece of paper worth anyway? Give them 6 years in school, and it won't make a lick of difference on the passing rate or skills. For the sake of the country, they need to implement quotas ASAP at the very least. 100,000+ graduates per year w/ BSNs and nowhere to go, and no choice but undersell their hardworking, formerly employed older brothers and sisters by paying to volunteer in the hospital? One ward with one staff nurse, a CI and 12-20 SNs. Yikes.

spongebob6286, BSN, RN · May 26, 2008

instead of improving th curriculum itself, why not focus their attentions in closing those low quality schools and address the problems of RNs unemployments..

woknblues · May 27, 2008

instead of improving th curriculum itself, why not focus their attentions in closing those low quality schools and address the problems of RNs unemployments..

My problem with just to arbitrarily close a school that has only a 40% passing rate is that what if you are a good student in that school, in your 3rd year, and your school is suddenly closed before you graduate? Your life is basically over. I can just them lined up the following day for the "consent to transfer" letters, then taking them to new schools, none of which will accept incoming 4th year students.

If the school simply instituted a quota with an exam and at each level, you would get a surge of merit based students. There seems to be no shortage of students enrolling in schools in the Philippines, so why not make it better for everyone by creating and maintaining a standard? I am not suggesting that every school need to weed out all the way like the SLU type of quota, but certainly, if you removed only the poorest performing 10% you would see a huge increase in overall passing rates. You should not be able to simply pay your tuition fee, warm the seat for 8 hours a day and walk away with a bachelors degree in 4 years.

Eventual closure of the poor performing schools should come from people NOT ATTENDING THOSE SCHOOLS. A private institution should only be as good as their bottom line. Sad to say, but "the people" should be investigating more thoroughly the schools that they attend before doing so. A 40% or less should be all the "red flag" I would need as a parent to not send my child to that school. Look at the LPN school scam. There were waiting lists to get into them, because they "promised the world"... They can't do a darn thing with the degree when they get it. It is not worth the paper it is printed on. People didn't check their facts, and got burned. How many? who knows? They are still running them, so a conservative estimate might be 100,000 people... A well known college in northern luzon has a 20% passing average.

Public schools are even simpler. They should have their budgets based upon a sliding scale of performance on standardized tests. The higher the scores, the more budget allotted. If they are not doing it like that, they are crazy.

dave787 · May 27, 2008

im not in favor of the additional hours this will just make the school richer without enhancing the students skills and theory. best thing to the Ched should track down schools that does not show good result in the licensure exam and invite students to school were the center for education in the region to enroll. make strict recomendation and evauated studnts who are realy for nursing field. :down: :down: :down: :down: :down: :down: :down: :down: :down: :down: :down:

suzanne4, RN · May 27, 2008

The program actually used to be five years and this is when the reputation of being excellent Filipino nurses started. And not one of them had any issues with the time that they spent and what they actually did learn. Their skill level was excellent, but we are no longer seeing that with the programs that are threre now, and when I get pms and e-mails sent to be with anectodal notes about those that have paid someone in a nursing office for information on a patient to complete their required cases that they have never done, then I most definitely agree with what the government should be doing there. There would be no way to fudge any of the requirements at all.

And this is what needs to be done.

Sorry, but when a new grad has never placed a foley catheter, or NG tube, or administered a medication IM and IV, then they should not be considered a BSN as they do not have the basic skills that one should possess by the time that they finish a full 4 year program.

Schools need to be closed and the standards returned to what they once were. Or things are only going to continue to get worse.

jennygump · May 28, 2008

IMO the extra year does not solve the problem. I think Ched is working on a wrong premise - that an extra year will improve the passing score. CHED will be penalizing good universities together with the substandard institutions if they carry this out.

Instead of imposing an extra year (for all) the CHED should begin to CLOSE nursing schools that have consistently performed terribly during the nurse board exams. If I had my way all schools that have less than 50% passing rate in the last two years - should be automatically CLOSED. And the dean, and owners of those substandard schools be suspended from nursing education. Those schools with 51% to 69% passing should be given a warning and one-year to get their passing rate up to at least 70%. If they fail - they should also be CLOSED. The target should be 90% passing rate.

Instead of adding extra RLE (clinical) hours - the CHED should stick to the existing number of hours because in my experience the duration is more than enough to become skilled. CHED should just make sure that the student nurses get to work in hospitals that have a ratio of at least one student to one patient. And the student nurse be allowed to practice nursing skills under the guidance of a competent clinical instructor.

I am not a big fan of CHED. I think they are often out of touch with the situation and come up with guidelines that make the system worse. I think CHED should stay away from the good universities and let them be.

suzanne4, RN · May 28, 2008

But I will take what the above poster wrote one step further:

How can a CI be proven competent if they start to teach as soon as they graduate and actually have no work experience? You will not see that being done in any other country.

The one year that was added in the past, it was not in a classroom, but actually being out in the world and working; the nurse was required to actually do 50 deliveries and not just watching, they also were the medical personnel for an entire village and got excellent experience plus they had one patient to one student back then. Not the 15 to 18 that we hear so much about.

They have to start with clearing up the messes that were created there, remember that you always here of the bad programs in everything. And unfortunately, since they have been permitted to mushroom all over, then the scope of nursing goes down the tubes and this affects everyone.

They need to have a proven skills test that must be completed and passed when one tests there for a license, that would be a perfect way to additionally check students.

Sorry, but a BSN that has no clinical skills but can pass an exam is not what I would call a nurse if they do not meet the minimal standards of what is expected for one to know when they get that title.

tiurichard · May 29, 2008

The program actually used to be five years and this is when the reputation of being excellent Filipino nurses started. And not one of them had any issues with the time that they spent and what they actually did learn. Their skill level was excellent, but we are no longer seeing that with the programs that are threre now, and when I get pms and e-mails sent to be with anectodal notes about those that have paid someone in a nursing office for information on a patient to complete their required cases that they have never done, then I most definitely agree with what the government should be doing there. There would be no way to fudge any of the requirements at all.
And this is what needs to be done.
Sorry, but when a new grad has never placed a foley catheter, or NG tube, or administered a medication IM and IV, then they should not be considered a BSN as they do not have the basic skills that one should possess by the time that they finish a full 4 year program.
Schools need to be closed and the standards returned to what they once were. Or things are only going to continue to get worse.

I think what needs to be done is that those schools who have opened should for the last three years should be closed.

I also graduated way back before the demand for nurses in the US even opens and back then we were only one section. I was under a four year program and believe me, I learned a lot of skills and even know a lot of procedures than the nurses in the ward at that time.

It doesn't have to mean that recent nurses are of poor quality, its the school were students are studying that were producing poor quality nurses.

woknblues · May 29, 2008

I think what needs to be done is that those schools who have opened should for the last three years should be closed.
*snip*
It doesn't have to mean that recent nurses are of poor quality, its the school were students are studying that were producing poor quality nurses.

I think just closing a new college that has been open for 3 years is pretty harsh, not on the schools, but on the students. On the other hand, CHED in this case is extremely reckless themselves by ALLOWING all these new schools to pop up. Obviously, they are getting political pressure to allow it, due to the ENORMOUS profits and economic potential that thousands of students and their tuition fees bring to an area. (Baguio City comes to mind immediately, though the situation is rampant everywhere throughout the country)

Agreed 100% with your second statement. Ultimately, each student is resposible for his/her education. If you "pay and pass", then you cannot expect to just "POOF!" become a nurse.

IMO the extra year does not solve the problem. I think Ched is working on a wrong premise - that an extra year will improve the passing score. CHED will be penalizing good universities together with the substandard institutions if they carry this out.
Instead of imposing an extra year (for all) the CHED should begin to CLOSE nursing schools that have consistently performed terribly during the nurse board exams. If I had my way all schools that have less than 50% passing rate in the last two years - should be automatically CLOSED. And the dean, and owners of those substandard schools be suspended from nursing education. Those schools with 51% to 69% passing should be given a warning and one-year to get their passing rate up to at least 70%. If they fail - they should also be CLOSED. The target should be 90% passing rate.

Instead of adding extra RLE (clinical) hours - the CHED should stick to the existing number of hours because in my experience the duration is more than enough to become skilled. CHED should just make sure that the student nurses get to work in hospitals that have a ratio of at least one student to one patient. And the student nurse be allowed to practice nursing skills under the guidance of a competent clinical instructor.

I am not a big fan of CHED. I think they are often out of touch with the situation and come up with guidelines that make the system worse. I think CHED should stay away from the good universities and let them be.

From the top, I have to disagree. I think that most of the universities (private)would be more than happy to have the student population take another year in tuition fee. the longer you have them, the more money they make. since you cannot shift "core nursing curriculum" courses from one institution to another, (complete BS that supports the "no standard adopted" routine, in my opinion).

Closing all schools w/ less than 50%? there would be 200,000 students with 1, 2 or 3 years of college completely wasted. Is that fair to them? What if they were among the 50% "Masipag" who are working their butts off?

You are right, CHED mandated limitations on clinical rotations is a good idea, but this will require massive amounts of RESTRUCTURING of the admission policies of nearly every college and university in the philippines. Think about it. How many students are there in nursing? lets say for argument, a million. about half a million are currently deployed in one way or another to the field for clinical rotations on a weekly basis. we have a finite number of facilities and a finite number of available patients, yet the number of nursing students is increasing exponentially.

Further than just out of touch, I would say that CHED may be MOST to blame for the problems happening in nursing education in the philippines. They are THE governing body of the educative process in the Philippines. They allow the licenses to operate colleges and universities. How they were able to allow hundreds of new colleges to open up within the last few years is an amazing lesson on greed and quick money.

im not in favor of the additional hours this will just make the school richer without enhancing the students skills and theory. best thing to the Ched should track down schools that does not show good result in the licensure exam and invite students to school were the center for education in the region to enroll. make strict recomendation and evauated studnts who are realy for nursing field.:down::down::down::down::down:

I like your idea. Get back to merit based enrollment. This can only happen through proper process through an actual governing body, and I think that CHED has lost all credibility. At the University level, private institutions need to do their part by actually enforcing some standard of what kind of student they can accept. a pulse and a savings account should not be the only two criteria.

The program actually used to be five years and this is when the reputation of being excellent Filipino nurses started. And not one of them had any issues with the time that they spent and what they actually did learn. Their skill level was excellent, but we are no longer seeing that with the programs that are threre now, and when I get pms and e-mails sent to be with anectodal notes about those that have paid someone in a nursing office for information on a patient to complete their required cases that they have never done, then I most definitely agree with what the government should be doing there. There would be no way to fudge any of the requirements at all.
And this is what needs to be done.
Sorry, but when a new grad has never placed a foley catheter, or NG tube, or administered a medication IM and IV, then they should not be considered a BSN as they do not have the basic skills that one should possess by the time that they finish a full 4 year program.
Schools need to be closed and the standards returned to what they once were. Or things are only going to continue to get worse.

I wonder if any school has the guts to initiate change without waiting for CHED to step in and do something about it. I wonder that because I doubt if CHED is anything more than a hollow body of profiteers themselves. I would respectfully disagree that 5 years is necessary for a BSN. The amount of time wasted in Filipino schools is breathtaking in my experience, having been to two. Classes are suspended for a week for the intramurals, for founder's days, for "nursing day pageants" etc., etc. Examination periods are 4 times a semester (prelim/first grading/midterm/final), disrupting classes for at least 3 days per exam period, for most schools, putting an enormous strain on the teachers to provide enough classroom hours of teaching, not to mention rescheduling of duties, etc.. These continual examinations are nothing more than "pay up to get your permit" breaks so the school can get their money. Community nursing? Perhaps in the historical setting of nursing education in the Philippines, this was actually a reasonable program. Community nursing today in the Philippines is nothing more than tired, useless census taking, fabrication of paperwork, and exhaustive and anal retentive "case presentations" lasting a week staffed by overworked and often embittered CI panelists who "drew the shortest straw" (and don't forget the Jolibee "bribe" to get the 85%) A 3 unit class on Rizal? Don't get me started. Modify this stuff, and there will be lots of time to get a decent education in 4 years.

But I will take what the above poster wrote one step further:
How can a CI be proven competent if they start to teach as soon as they graduate and actually have no work experience? You will not see that being done in any other country.
The one year that was added in the past, it was not in a classroom, but actually being out in the world and working; the nurse was required to actually do 50 deliveries and not just watching, they also were the medical personnel for an entire village and got excellent experience plus they had one patient to one student back then. Not the 15 to 18 that we hear so much about.
They have to start with clearing up the messes that were created there, remember that you always here of the bad programs in everything. And unfortunately, since they have been permitted to mushroom all over, then the scope of nursing goes down the tubes and this affects everyone.
They need to have a proven skills test that must be completed and passed when one tests there for a license, that would be a perfect way to additionally check students.
Sorry, but a BSN that has no clinical skills but can pass an exam is not what I would call a nurse if they do not meet the minimal standards of what is expected for one to know when they get that title.

So true. If a BSN degree in this environment barely gives you the skills to be a nurse, how can they even consider teaching what they do not know themselves? This is where CHED needs to have the will to demand qualifications from a supposed university or college level teacher. Anything less is unforgivable. The very new CIs are teaching "out of the books" in many cases, completely unaware of individual protocols that exist from institution to institution. The "education" that you receive in such classes is more often than not, a painful reminder that you are ON YOUR OWN when it comes to your education, in a lot of ways.