Africa-Press – Liberia. Liberia has become the second African country to launch an online or digital midwifery examination system, following its first launch in the subregion of Ghana, which shares a similar idea to enable Liberia to get such history recorded. Liberia’s record follows the launch of the online midwifery examination by the Liberia Board of Nursing and Midwifery in Monrovia over the weekend.
During the official launch of the digital midwifery examination system, Health Minister Dr. Wilhelmina Jallah described the initiative as a ‘leap of fate’ for Liberia, as the second country in Africa, following Ghana which is already in full swing.
This, according to Dr. Jallah, demonstrates that the country is now leaving behind a paper-based examination process and moving to a digital age. “Everything is going digital and some people are not inclined and they want to stay behind, but things are moving,” Dr. Jallah stated while serving as a launcher of the system.
“This is a long hard role ahead of us and you might say It might not work, but we must not be terrified.” Dr. Jallah noted that the digital process has a huge benefit and denied cheating during examination, as well as curtailing administrative burden.
She also noted that the digital process will support an environmentally friendly environment by avoiding cutting down trees to produce papers. At the same time, Minister Jallah then promised the Ministry of Health support towards the digital examination process to make it successful and to take ownership of the digital exam.
For her part, providing an overview of the process, the registrar at the Liberia Board of Nursing and Midwifery, Cecelia C. Kpangbala-Flomo, said the initiative derived from how a more effective system of administering exams would be adopted, following an increase in nursing schools and population of students leaving from those institutions.
“Distinguished stakeholders, we are honored to announce that Liberia has become the second African Country to embark on this worthy project,” Madam Flomo averred.
As such, Madam Flomo said using the digital system to take the National State Board Examination is important and will replace traditional the traditional one used to administer the exam, which is paper-based.
According to her, the paper-based process of administering exams has been challenging and costly, considering labor, time, and logistics. Furthermore, she noted that taking examination materials to places like the southeast, comes with challenges and the possibility of exposure; before being administered, as such, the digital exam is efficient.
Madam Flomo at the same time informed the public that the process to endure the digital examination was successful, follows several negotiations with both stakeholders in Liberia and Ghana, which lead to a visiting the Midwifery Council of Ghana coming to train the secretariat staff of the LBNM to administer midwifery exam.
Conducting an online exam, according to her, is cost-effective and considers low labor, as well as increase efficiency. “When we are supported to do this, our results may come up with four weeks, and we will turn the nurses over,” Madam Flomo maintained.
With such a system, according to her, the Liberia Board of Nursing and Midwifery will need more technical staffs, who will be trained to run the secretariat of the institution as well as two office buildings, because the one currently being used poses challenges to the institution’s work.
