Fast approaching 2024—this serves as an opportune time for us at Alice Lee Centre for Nursing Studies (NUS Nursing), National University of Singapore Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine to take stock of the year that has passed and align our purpose for the way forward.
COVID-19 left an indelible impact on healthcare systems and healthcare professionals around the world even as the World Health Organization officially announced its step-down from pandemic to endemic status in May 2023. As an education institution dedicated to developing clinically competent, empathetic and caring Nursing professionals, it is clear that we will need to adapt our thinking and doing—so as to rise above the increasingly challenging landscape while nurturing future-ready Nursing graduates.
The introduction of the new Common Curriculum for Healthcare Professional Education is one such effort to align with our nation’s future vision of healthcare—the ‘Healthier SG’ initiative. Comprising five courses and an immersive Longitudinal Patient Experience (LPE), the new Common Curriculum for Healthcare Professional Education is specially curated to focus on preventive healthcare and facilitate ageing in place using technology and analytics.
We will also for the first time see the cohort of 870 first-year NUS Nursing, Medicine, Dentistry and Pharmacy students across four healthcare disciplines collaborate in their learning journey. Thus far, feedback from the cohort that has just completed its first course Social and Behavioural Determinants of Health and starting on LPE is positive.
This year, we also celebrated Associate Professor Shefaly Shorey’s successful completion of her Fulbright Visiting Scholar Program. As the first NUS Nursing academic to have done that, she is not only an inspiration to her peers, but also a role model for her students.
I am confident that her exposure and experience will prove invaluable to her research and teaching. As global travel continues to pick up pace, we are hopeful that some of these collaborations would come to fruition—opening new gateways of opportunities such as student exchanges for NUS Nursing and our students.
Another academic who did NUS Nursing proud is Assistant Professor Shawn Goh. He became the fourth academic to be awarded the prestigious American Academy of Nursing Fellowship after Professor Wang Wenru, Professor He Hong-Gu and Assistant Professor Catherine Dong in October 2023. This conferment is a recognition of A/Prof Goh’s contributions to the Nursing profession, and NUS Nursing’s work in Asia.
Just as fearless when it comes to reaching for new heights, two of our Year 3 students recently led a team of 19 NUS students on a seven-day expedition through the Buran Ghati trek to reach the 4,572-metre summit. Four other NUS Nursing students joined them. We are optimistic that their indomitable resilience, stamina and teamwork would come in handy as they transit into their Nursing careers later.
Finally, our congratulations also go out to NUS Nursing alumnus, Dr Loh Huey Peng. She was among one of three to receive the President’s Award for Nurses 2023. Her personal manifesto of “Value what you do, and add value to what you are doing” is not just good advice for practising Nursing professionals, it is also a sound reminder for Nursing educators like us—because it is only when we value what we do, and add value to what we are doing that we can continuously do better for our students and NUS Nursing.
Prof Liaw Sok Ying
Head (NUS Alice Lee Centre for Nursing Studies)
