Ministry of Health and Welfare Adds 2,715 Clinical Support Nurses... Training Starts from the 18th

Increase in Scale to a Total of 11,000 People

The Ministry of Health and Welfare announced on the 12th that it will add 2,715 Physician Assistant (PA) nurses to fill the medical gap caused by the departure of residents.

On the same day, the Ministry discussed the PA nurse training plan at the Central Accident Response Headquarters meeting for the doctors' collective action, chaired by Minister Cho Kyu-hong.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

According to the Ministry, a survey of 47 tertiary hospitals and 328 general hospitals found that as of the end of March, there are 8,982 active PA nurses. The Ministry plans to increase this number by 2,715, bringing the total to about 11,000 PA nurses.

To help PA nurses adapt to their duties, training will be provided starting from the 18th of this month.

The training targets include newly assigned PA nurses, PA nurses with less than one year of experience, and the nurses responsible for their training.

From the day training begins, in cooperation with the Korean Nurses Association, an 8-hour training for training nurses and a 24-hour training for PA nurses will be piloted. Afterwards, a standard program will be developed to provide intensive training totaling 80 hours (48 hours theory + 32 hours practice) across eight fields: surgery, general surgery, internal medicine, emergency and critical care, cardiovascular, renal dialysis, wound ostomy, and nutrition intensive care.

The Central Accident Response Headquarters also checked the operation of the emergency medical system and the status of the doctors' collective action on the same day.

As of the previous day, the number of general inpatients at tertiary hospitals was 21,262, a 4.7% decrease compared to the average a week earlier. The total number of general inpatients at all general hospitals, including tertiary hospitals, was 84,455, down 2.4%.

The number of intensive care unit inpatients was 2,790 at tertiary hospitals, a 2.7% decrease from the previous week, and 6,961 at all general hospitals, down 1.8% from the previous week.

Among 408 emergency rooms, 394 (97%) operated without reducing beds, and as of the 9th, the number of severe and emergency patients in emergency rooms increased by 1.3% compared to the weekly average. The number of doctors working in emergency rooms at regional emergency medical centers was 486, similar to the previous week, and the number of doctors working in intensive care units was 430, a 2.1% increase from June 2.

Minister Cho said, "I am grateful for the dedication of the medical staff, including doctors and nurses, who are silently standing by patients at this very moment," and added, "The government will further strengthen necessary support to reduce the burden on medical staff in the field."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.