Over 1,000 apply for nursing assistant programme

KINNESHA GEORGE-HARRY

Over 1,000 people have applied for the Enrolled Nursing Assistant (ENA) training programme which commences on October 1.

Secretary of Health, Wellness and Family Development Dr Agatha Carrington made the disclosure as she addressed reporters during Wednesday’s post Executive Council media briefing at the Division of Tourism, Culture and Transportation in Sangsters Hill, Scarborough.

She said: “We have been fortunate to have over 1,000 applications and we’ve started our assessment centre interviews as the second level of assessments will continue. We feel certain that we would have a first cohort of students starting on October 1, our second cohort will start in April of next year and the third cohort will start four months later.”

She said the total number of students to be trained will be 75, with 25 in each cohort. She stressed there is a need to fill vacancies in this particular sector, following a number of retirements over the years.

Also, in October, Carrington said the men’s blue room would be launched.

This space, she said, caters for men’s screening in clinical care as well as social support.

With respect to the adolescents, the Secretary said the Adolescent Health Programme (De Living Room) will be opened the second week of October, “allowing for us to strengthen our adolescent health services.”

She said one group that would not be forgotten is the differently abled within the society.

“Their space as well… the social support facility is to be handed over to them in week three of October and in the final week in the month of October, the facilities for the elderly is to be handed over.

“Essentially, what we’re trying to do is to ensure that each group in our population is catered for and we think we’ve catered for the men, the women, the adolescents, the elderly, the differently abled… we have looked at all of those,” she said, adding that the final group to be dealt with in the early part of 2020 is the children’s lab. She said more information on this children’s lab would be divulged later.

Without giving much details, the Secretary said there will be the expanded mediation services, which caters for employees at all divisions within the THA as well as the expanded reach of the Alcohol and Drug Abuse Prevention Programme (ADAPP), through the recent hosting of a substance abuse symposium, which focused on drug trafficking and its effects and the SOBER Effect, which is a web-series discussing substance abuse in the society.