What do you think is the biggest challenge facing nursing and health students today?
There are several challenges that a healthy student faces during its educational period, which is the foundation of years of practice ahead. The biggest of them all, however, is very well known and is often associated with each of the health and nursing students. That is the lack of time. Making time for everything seems impossible for a health student.
Health and nursing students are known for being very busy with their academic routines to pay attention to anything else. Nursing and medical schools are very demanding itself. Add coursework, clinical work, and personal reading required for homework in it, and there is not much time left for anything else. Nursing students are seen to be the first ones leaving the homes and the last ones reaching back home for rest.
The realization of this hectic routine often comes as a shock to the health students and their parents when they enroll in the medical schools. Having the realization beforehand could help a lot. Being very realistic about what can be accomplished during this period of the student life and what cannot be accomplished would not put a load of failed expectations on the shoulders of the health students. The more early the students understand and accept that their majority of time will be devoted to the school work routine and they would have to leave out on major routine entertainments and holidays would make them less sour later.
In tackling this, students should have their priorities straight. They should have clear decisions on what they are going to do with their excess time (if they get it). Organizing your time can help. Expecting to have an active social life along with attending medical schools is very unrealistic. It can only lead to distress and high exhaustion (Huhn, et al., 2016).
Another major challenge which health and nursing students face at this time is the financial issues. It can be a big challenge for the nursing students. While having different programs for nursing and health schools with older students enrolled in them, there is a greater possibility of having financial issues. The greater number of financial obligations besides the school in the form of mortgages, or financing a family can burden the health students financially. With less access to the scholarships and trainee grants, the health and nursing students of the current period are more likely to increase their debt for financial funding of the schooling.
Even in this respect, the lack of time makes things difficult. There are many scholarships available, but the health and nursing students are either not aware of these or do not think that they have time to fulfill the application process that the scholarships demand. The writing of three essays, and getting transcripts and letter of recommendations takes a lot of time, which the health students lack pretty much all the time. But scholars have stressed on the point to take time out for the scholarships. Students who are working part-time to pay for the finances could spend so much less of this time on the application process and will have the finances and the time spent on part-time job freed (Wojciechowski, 2017).
There are increasing numbers of international students who are going abroad for good study conditions. These students specifically in the health sector also face similar to varying challenges. The study conducted on the international medical health students show that social exclusion is one of the challenges that these students face due to their language barriers and cultural differences. It is to be noted that time for social activities is always less for the health students. However, there complete cut off from the society makes them undergo depression and stress.
Thus, it can be said that the biggest challenge facing the health and nursing students is the lack of time and the high demands of the medical school. The lack of finances and increase in debt due to the medical schooling is another big challenge. Giving time to better organizing and applying for scholarships can aid in this respect.
References
Huhn, D., Huber, J., Ippen, F. M., Eckart, W., Junne, F., Zipfel, S., . . . Nikendei, C. (2016). International medical students’ expectations and worries at the beginning of their medical education: a qualitative focus group study. BMC Medical Education, 16(1), 33.
Wojciechowski, M. (2017, December 12). Challenges Facing Nursing Students Today. Retrieved January 24, 2018, from http://minoritynurse.com/challenges-facing-nursing-students-today/
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