Advanced Professional Nursing at HMU

Some weeks ago I had met Prof. Dr. Chuc of the Hanoi Medical University  and when she suggested that I join her teaching team for the 4-year bachelor course in Advanced Professional Nursing I said; "Why not".

Entry Hall of Main Building

The course, I was told, is taught in English, which makes it easier for me. Why English? Well, these young nurses are trained to work in international environments, international hospitals in Vietnam or in neighbouring countries like Singapore, Japan, Malaysia or Thailand, where there is a huge demand in nursing staff. Traditionally these countries recruit in Korea or the Philippines, but the demand is growing, and from the Vietnamese point of view it makes sense to expand it's expatriate workforce. So minutes I wondered. Was this the same country that had a big shortage of nursing staff in it's own hospitals? Yes it was, was the political will is to send migrant workers to other countries as a way of increasing national income.

Courtyard in one of the lecture buildings

So I found myself responsible for a 2 week, 20 hour course on "Legal aspects of Health Care". My Dean at he Hanoi School had approved of my spending some of mu time at HMU, and last Tuesday afternoon there I was, in front of a class of up to 60 students.

Nurses are mostly female - true also in Vietnam

My curriculum focussed on general legal aspects which are more or less universal. What is law? Where does it come from? What is fault/guilt/tort? How do you prove? What is evidence? When is non-action as bad as doing something wrong? And of course we talked about nursing-specific topics like informed consent, confidentiality, special patient groups and their rights (to mention some). I have taught that so many times in Germany.

It turned out that my students were not all that good in English. Asking them questions caused more embarrassment than it brought responses. But you have to admit, hearing all these legal terms is no easy thing, even native speakers.  I tried not to be too strict while some students really made up for their mates by being really good. In addition, my Vietnamese colleague gave short summaries of the lessons in Vietnamese to ensure the learning benefit.
In the breaks, my colleague took me to the teacher's room. Here I was proudly presented the latest hit in Vietnamese climate technology: A fan with integrated moisture unit to ensure that the cooled air (we are not talking about an aircon!) is not too dry. Very impressive!

Air-moisturizing fan. How have we lived without it in Hanoi?

And we had a lot of fun when we had our exercise: We simulated a civil court hearing about a young man who had been run over by a car, taken to hospital but forgotten in the emergency department until his his brain had been permanently damaged. Nasty things like that happen. The students could chose to be plaintiff, defendant, witness, lawyer or judge, got their specific background information and we had a very good exercise. They had really thought about their roles, included things we had learnt in their argumentation and were really great.

After my part, a Vietnamese colleague, Prof Luong, lectured about some legal specifics in Vietnam, laws on examination and treatment, on health insurance and about HIV/Aids prevention.
So as a conclusion, the students had to agree: Law is everywhere, we are surrounded by regulations, legal arguments and problems on all sides, in private and professional life. Hopefully our course made them more aware and less afraid about this.