For this society to rediscuss the nursing act, there must be scientific evidence that can objectively prove its necessary, some experts within the National Assembly said, drawing the attention of related parties.
The National Assembly Research Service (NARS) said so in the article “How the Nursing Act debate should moving forward” in its paper, "Issue and Point."
NARS said there are controversies and conflicts among different vocations regarding the Nursing Act and that it is necessary to forecast the demand for nursing and care services and workforce estimates first to improve the acceptability of the proposed law.
“We must scientifically validate the reason or need for the nursing act to expand the scope of practice of nurses beyond the healthcare setting and into the community,” it said. “We need service demand and workforce projections to ensure that the nursing and caregiving workforce is available to meet the growing demand for community care services.”
After pinpointing critical increases in care and support services in the community, it needs to validate and forecast the amount and trend of increased demand for services and look for blind spots or gaps in services not being served by the collaborative care and support workforce, the article pointed out.
The paper also noted that the level of nursing and care staffing and the level of services provided in the community should be aligned with improving nurses’ working environment and the supply of professional nurses, which is another reason for enacting the Nursing Act.
To this end, NARS said that objective data analysis should be conducted by collecting and indexing statistical data, such as the number and utilization rate of nursing and care services, the amount and trend of increasing demand for nursing and care services, unmet demand for nursing and care services and obstacles to service provision, the number of nursing and care personnel by position and compensation, changes in the size of organizations providing nursing and care services, and the competition rate of nursing and care-related professional education and training institutions such as nursing universities.
It also stressed the need to coordinate interests for collaboration among different vocational areas.
“The principle in coordinating interests is to ensure that the authority and work performance of nurses does not act as a factor in regulating qualifications and work restrictions for nursing assistants,” it said. “The nursing law should be supplemented with standards for attribution of responsibility for nurse guidance on the scope and limitations of nurses’ work assistance performed by nursing aides.”