Who's guarding the guardian?

The root cause of the scandal engulfing the recent nursing licensure examinations lies in the fact that the members of the current exam board for nurses were handpicked by the president of the Philippine Nurses Association. The president, meanwhile, happens to be the owner of both a nursing school and a review center from where the leak allegedly came.

This conflict of interest situation occurs because under the nursing law, the chairman and members of the board of examiners are nominated solely by the Philippine Nurses Association, a regulatory devise intended to be a self-policing, peer-regulating mechanism which has gone awfully awry.

There is a Latin phrase which aptly describes it: Quis custodiet ipsos custodies?, meaning "Who will guard the guardians?". There arises the opportunity for a conflict of interest in the fact that the guardian is chosen by the guarded. In the bar exams, it is the Supreme Court which picks the examiner. The Bar itself does not appoint nor nominate the examiners. This arms-length relationship develops an independence of mind between the two, which then ensures the credibility and integrity of the bar examination.

About 42,000 nursing graduates took the last board exam in eleven testing centers around the country, with a passing rate of 42% or about 17,000 nursing students.

This issue confronting the profession hits close to home as both my parents were nurses. I have high respect for the profession, and I want it to maintain its integrity. In fact, I authored the original nurses law, as well as co-authored the amendment in 1992, which seeks to protect and improve the profession by promoting a more relevant nursing education, better working conditions, wider career prospects and a dignified existence for our nurses.

The Philippines currently holds the distinction of being the leading provider of nurses to the world. We cannot afford to stain the well-deserved good reputation of Filipino nurses and risk their employment chances. Hence, we must ensure that we continue to produce excellent nurses not only to meet foreign demand but more critically, for the health care needs of the country.