New nurses opt for NTWC hospitals
Thanks to the generous sharing of expertise and experience by their mentors, about 90 fresh graduates from the School of General Nursing at Tuen Mun Hospital has determined that they will work in hospitals in the New Territories West Cluster.
To Tiffany Kwan, a fresh graduate from the School of General Nursing at Tuen Mun Hospital (TMH), currently working in the medicine ward at Pok Oi Hospital, a position she describes as “a dream job”, she thanks her tutors for sharing their expertise and experience.
Looking back on her three years as a trainee, her most striking memory is her first experience as an intern on a hospital ward.
“The ward was extremely busy and I was quite intimidated by the unfamiliar environment,” she recalls. Fortunately, the senior staff were more than willing to offer her assistance and advice, she adds with a smile.
Tiffany’s interest in becoming a nurse was sparked by the experience she had after suffering a cruciate ligament injury before sitting for a public examination. Her time as an inpatient at TMH gave her an up-close insight into life as a frontline healthcare provider and she was particularly impressed by the vital role that nurses play on the wards.
Around 80 per cent of these latest TMH School of General Nursing graduates are now working in hospitals in the New Territories West Cluster, which will help to strengthen the cluster’s nursing team.
The Hospital Authority currently operates three general nursing schools, one each at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Caritas Medical Centre and Tuen Mun Hospital. The schools offer a three-year Higher Diploma in Nursing programme. The programme commences in each September and is very intensive. The subjects include generic subjects, nursing arts and sciences, basic and applied sciences, and behavioural & social sciences. Students need to start their clinical practicum in the first term of their first year and are expected to complete a 1,480-hour clinical practicum. Every year, there are about 300 students graduated from the three nursing schools and most of them will choose to work in public hospitals to spread the spirit of Florence Nightingale.