Abstract:

St. Luke’s School of Nursing and Midwifery is located at a rural Mission Settlement in Mpanshya, Zambia. It opened in 2009, with just 30 students, but was recognized for its success and innovation and upgraded, now serving 210 students. 400 have successfully graduated and work across the country.

To accommodate the increased intake and meet quality training standards the School pioneered a decentralized practical training model, the first of its kind in Zambia.

Zambia, like many other low income countries, faces considerable challenges in providing sufficient human resources for health. It has a shortfall of 9’000 nurses (60% of its requirement). Rural hospitals suffer particularly drastic gaps between planned and actual staffing numbers, with difficulties retaining them. Zambia failed to meet MDG5 (UNDP, 2013) and still only 47% of births are attended to by skilled personnel, contributing to maternal mortality of 440 deaths in 100,000 live births. International health strategies (WHO 2008, 2010) and Zambia’s national health priorities (MoH, 2011, 2012, 2013) emphasizes training institutions need to increase their output.

Keywords: Pioneering, Decentralized practicum sites, quality, practical-training, rural, Zambia

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