The Management of the Youth Employment Agency (YEA) has allayed the fears harboured by the Ghana Registered Nurses and Midwives Association (GRNMA) that, trained persons under the Community Health Workers (CHWs) Module are going to be assigned the functions reserved for professionally trained nurses in the various health facilities across the country.

The reassurance followed a crunch meeting called at the instance of the Management of YEA with the leadership of GRNMA to trash out the seeming impasse arising out of wrong media reportage concerning the job description of beneficiaries under the YEA’s Community Health Workers programme in partnership with the Ghana Health Service (GHS).

The GRNMA had expressed their displeasure over a news bulletin carried in various media outlets to the effect that CHW beneficiaries would be assigned jobs like recording medical history and symptoms, bedside care, conducting physical examinations of patients in the health facilities, etc. which are a preserve of professionally trained nurses.

The GRNMA had vehemently opposed the onward implementation of the CHWs programme in the format they had perceived it to be.  

Their agitation also stems from the fact that there is a backlog of over 10,000 professionally trained Community Health Nurses waiting to be deployed by the Ghana Health Service after their three-year training and that this backlog could be deployed for the purposes for which the YEA is recruiting the 5,000 CHW Bbeneficiaries.

The President of GRNMA, Mrs. Perpetual Ofori-Ampofo, said the trained nurses are better placed to execute those functions - saying government should rather deploy them to fill any vacancy.

Mrs. Ofori-Ampofo and her team, however, are of the view that dialogue is key and for that matter, the GHS should have involved the GRNMA in coming out with the curriculum for the CHWs to avoid usurpation of roles.

However, contrary to the erroneous claim that the CHWs will serve as caregivers, the agency has assured that the CHWs by their mandate will not come into contact with patients at the hospitals but rather perform purely supportive services and preventive care delivery, provide support and assistance to communities, families and individuals with preventive health measures.

They are also to create a bridge between providers of health, social and community services and communities that may have difficulty in accessing these services.

The Chief Executive Officer of the YEA, Mr. Kofi Baah Agyepong who invited the GRNMA for the crunch meeting, in his submission, stated that the core mandate of the agency is to provide jobs for the youth and that they will not engage in any activity that will lead to the loss of jobs or opportunities for any group of people in Ghana.

Mr. Agyepong further assured that the agency would liaise with the Ministry of Health (M.O.H) for a joint meeting to address the concerns raised in a dialogue on the CHWs Module.

He explained the need for effective collaboration from all stakeholders especially the GRNMA in implementing the CHW programme.

Mr. Agyepong was emphatic that the agency will not substitute the role of professionally trained nurses with that of the CHWs and that the functions of health professionals will not be usurped in any way.

He was elated by the renewed commitment of the GRNMA and expressed gratitude of the Agency to the GRNMA team for the mutual understanding reached.

The GRNMA team was extremely happy that there was a dialogue to solve the issue at stake and thanked the CEO for convening that meeting.