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UA prof teaches nursing skills in Vietnam

Trip next month will help health care workers develop

While most UA students celebrate the end of finals, a UA professor will be helping Vietnamese health care leaders develop a nursing curriculum.

Sandra Cromwell, a University of Arizona assistant nursing professor, will spend May 15 to 26 in Nam Dinh, Vietnam, teaching health care leaders how to assess patients' health.

Cromwell will teach the Vietnamese health care workers skills such as how to use a stethoscope or how to find out about a patient's health history.

This trip is Cromwell's first teaching visit to northern Vietnam, which she said is an honor since the Vietnamese government gave permission for her visit. She also taught nursing leaders in Ho Chi Minh City, in southern Vietnam, in 1998 and 1996.

"The goal of our project is to help them in whatever ways they identify," Cromwell said. "It's an ongoing international collaboration that I'm proud to be a part of because I think they're making a difference."

Vietnam's universities do not offer a master's degree program in nursing, so the Friendship Bridge - a Denver-based humanitarian non-profit organization - is trying to help them develop a master's curriculum and advance their nursing methods.

Vietnamese students must travel to Australia or Thailand in order to receive a master's in nursing, Cromwell said.

Friendship Bridge Nurses Group has taught 10 courses in Vietnam about nursing skills since they began working with the country in 1990, said Kathy Whitney, the coordinator for the organization's nursing focus group.

"Our whole focus is to support the advancement and nursing education in Vietnam," Whitney said.

Professors from other universities, such as the University of Texas at San Antonio, University of Wyoming and the University of Colorado, are also involved.

The students taught by the Friendship Bridge Nurses Group have bachelor's degrees in nursing and work as community health department directors, directors of nursing at health care organizations or professors.

"They are the most motivated students I have ever seen in my life, and our (UA) nursing students are pretty motivated," Cromwell said.

Cromwell said she is not worried about her safety and that she is not a target because she is an American.

"I'm really not in as much danger as I would be in downtown New York City," she said.

Cromwell said that the Vietnamese health care workers are trying to become part of the global community and make their nursing ability equal to other countries.

"They want to interact with the global community, and we want them to be a part of it," she said. "The world is getting very, very small. We need to start talking to each other very fast."

Cromwell added that Vietnam's nursing ability is about comparable to the United States' many years ago.

"They are sort of like we were 30 years ago, maybe 40," she said.

Cromwell said one of the country's problems with the nursing profession is that countries such as the United States and France have provided them with equipment but not with training.

"They take us to equipment and say 'what is it?'" Cromwell said. "They also need resources to do it themselves."

She said her organization tries to teach the Vietnamese nursing leaders how to use equipment as well as how to advance their nursing methods.

"Despite all the common rhetoric, this is a country that wants to become progressive, wants to become stable," Cromwell said.

She added that she realized the importance of being open to other cultures during her experiences in Vietnam, and she now stresses the significance of cultural diversity to her UA students.

Cromwell added that the Vietnamese are not focused on the Vietnam War, the way some Americans are- probably because they have fought wars since then.

"We are still living with it - it's our hang-up," she said. "They've moved beyond it - it only comes up because we are Americans."

She added the Vietnamese refer to the war as the "American War."

Many Vietnamese professionals left their country at the end of the Vietnam War in fear of oppression or for safety, she said.

"There was a huge brain drain at the end of the American War," Cromwell said.

Cromwell said that she hopes after the trip this summer to teach nursing skills in Vietnam again in two years.

Pamela Reed, associate dean for academic affairs of the UA College of Nursing, said Cromwell's work in Vietnam helps to fulfill part of the college's mission to serve other countries and gain knowledge from that service.

"We have lots to learn from experiences in other countries, whether it be Third World or other countries," Reed said.

She added international work programs can provide UA professors with more ideas about the science of healing.

"We need knowledge from all over the world to better understand that and better inform us about health care and nursing care," Reed said.

Rachael Myer can be reached at Rachael.Myer@wildcat.arizona.edu.