Every year on May 12th Rwanda Nurses and Midwives Union joins the rest of the world to celebrate International Nurses Day. This day coincides with the anniversary to celebrate the birth of Florence Nightingale.
As recently announced by the International Council of Nurses (ICN), the theme for International Nurses Day 2021 the theme for this year’s celebrations is Nurses: A Voice to Lead, A Visions for Future Healthcare.
The COVID-19 pandemic has shown the world the important role nurses play not only in Rwanda but also globally. Whereas there has been significant disruption to healthcare service delivery, there has been great innovation that has improved access to health care.
This year’s celebrations focused on the changes and innovations in nursing and how they will ultimately shape the future of healthcare. As the largest healthcare profession, nurses should not only play an integral part in planning the future of healthcare, but also play a key role towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
This year’s celebrations was further aimed at increasing the public awareness about midwives and nurses’ contribution towards Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and Health Care Innovation and celebrate their story, to inspire us for action by demonstrating how nurses can influence their surroundings and communities to create a healthier world.
It was an opportunity to evaluate Nurses and Midwives of their achievements and fix new targets at their respective levels of engagement.
Just as it is at the global level, Nurses and Midwives are the majority of health care providers in Rwanda, They contribute around 70 % of registered health providers in Rwanda. It is no doubt that Nurses and Midwives are contributing a lot in most of SDGs implementation.
To celebrate under strict adherence to COVID – 19 preventive measures, RNMU took the lead in organizing the celebrations across all Health facilities (HFs) in the country. Celebrations were held at the work place level.
There were activities for International Nursing and Nursing week such as:
- Ccelebrations of the international midwives day held online via zoom
- Students associations will visited high schools with an aim of encouraging students to join the nursing/midwifery profession
- Community outreach activities for NCDs screening in Huye and Rulindo districts
- Radio and TV talks shows throughout the week
- Live broadcast of the Wednesday 12th May 2021celebrations on on BTN.
- To climax the week long activities, live zoom ccelebrations were held on Wednesday 12nd May 2021.
The Rwanda Association of midwives (RAM) took the lead to celebrate the Iinternational Day of the Midwife on 5th/May/2021 to highlight the important role midwives play in the health of mothers, children and their families. Midwives play a vital role in providing health services. They devote their lives to caring for mothers and children; giving lifesaving immunizations and health advice.
All sites that celebrated connected to one live zoom centre. Health facilities were also free to celebrate at working place level but where possible, some connected to the zoom that was controlled at RNMU head office.
Pparticipants that took part of the live national celebrations were Nyarugenge District Hospital, CHUK, CHUB, Gatonde district Hhospital, King Faisal Hospital, the private chapter through La Croix du Sud Hospital, Bweyeye Health Centre and Gakenke district bureau and Rulindo district. All the celebrating sites cut cake as a symbol of joy and happiness for their day.
Presentations were made by all the participating sites and the event was crowned with a great message from the Hon Minister of state Dr Lt Col Mpunga Tharcisse.
