Replies to LegCo questions

LCQ19: Manpower for psychiatric nurses

Following is a question by the Hon Michael Mak and a written reply by the Secretary for Health, Welfare and Food, Dr Yeoh Eng-kiong, in the Legislative Council today (March 3):

Question:

In regard to the staffing of registered nurses (psychiatric) (RNs(P)), will the Government inform this Council:

(a) of the target ratio of RNs(P) to patients determined by the Hospital Authority (HA), and the actual ratio at the end of each of the past five years;

(b) of the numbers of patient-days in respect of psychiatry inpatient services, attendances and new cases at psychiatric specialist outpatient clinics, as well as service attendances for community psychiatric services provided by HA in each of the past five years;

(c) of the respective numbers of RNs(P) employed by HA and the Department of Health at the end of each of the past five years, and the numbers of new appointees and those who left the service, broken down by ranks and salary points respectively, in each of the past five years; and

(d) based on the target ratio of RNs(P) to patients, the number of such nurses in service and their wastage rate, and the number of patients, of the number of places of pre-employment courses for such nurses that should have been offered in each of the past five years; the respective numbers of actual places of those courses and graduates in each of the past five years, as well as the number of places that will be offered in each of the next three years; and provide breakdowns of the aforesaid numbers based on places and graduates by training institutions, levels of the courses, and whether such courses are public-funded?

Reply:

Madam President,

(a) The Hospital Authority (HA) plans its manpower for psychiatric nurses by making reference to factors such as service type, patients' dependency, unit size and bed occupancy rate, etc. A simple ratio of psychiatric nurses to patients is not sufficient for the purpose of manpower planning. HA has therefore not set a target ratio. The actual manpower situation in the past five years can be seen from the reply to parts (b) and (c).

(b) The data are shown in Table 1.

Some new appointees were enrolled nurses before being appointed as RNs(P). These appointees enjoyed a salary point higher than the minimum salary point of RNs(P) in their previous post. They were thus offered a salary at their original salary point on appointment as RN(P)s and the salary offered differed from case to case, depending on the appointee's original salary. Other new appointees entered at the minimum salary point in the past five years are shown in Table 3.

The salary points of those who left the service range from Point 15 (HK$20,010 for 02/03) to Point 26 (HK$33,705 for 99/00 & 00/01; HK$ 34,505 for 01/02; HK$34,505 and HK33,940 for 02/03; HK$33,940 and HK32,900 for 03/04). (See note)

The Department of Health has not employed any RNs(P) in the past five years.

(d) There is no UGC-funded programme that specifically trains psychiatric nurses. We understand that there are currently two self-financed psychiatric nursing education programmes offered by the local universities, one being offered by the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK), with an annual training capacity of 30, and the other by the Hong Kong Polytechnic University (HKPU), with an annual training capacity of around 60. The CUHK programme commenced in 2001. To date, there have been 19 graduates from the course offered by the CUHK. The HKPU programme commenced in 2002 and there has been no graduate yet. At present, there are a total of 49 employees from HA enrolled in the two programmes in 2003. A cumulative total of 87 HA nurses are currently studying in the two programmes and they are expected to graduate as registered psychiatric nurse in the next 18 months. We have no information as yet on the training capacity of these two self-financed psychiatric nursing education programmes in the coming years.

Note: There was only departure by an RN(P) at point 15 in 02/03 while there were departures by RNs(P) at point 26 in each of the past five years.

Ends/Wednesday, March 3, 2004

NNNN

Table 1

Type	1999/00	2000/01	2001/02	2002/03	2003/04 (up to Jan 04)
Patient days for psychiatric services(incl. Mentally handicapped services)	1,887,811	1,853,017	1,695,559	1,650,665	1,322,871
Psychiatric SOP attendances	432,046	471,228	511,127	549,133	447,297
SOP New cases	20,148	21,398	24,224	26,005	17,802
Community psychiatric service attendances and home visits	49,363	57,002	71,408	82,199	66,348

Table 2

RNs(P)	1999/00	2000/01	2001/02	2002/03	2003/04 (up to Jan 04)
Intake*	86	92	110	23	19
Turnover	5	2	12	7	19
No. of RN(P)	787	877	978	994	977

* Intake includes external recruits and internal graduating nurses in HA.

Table 3

Year	Minimum Point
99/00	Point 17 HK$22,075
00/01 01/02 02/03 April 03 �V Dec 03	Point 15 HK$20,010
Jan 04 onwards	Point 15 HK$19,463