The Gretta Foundation, USA
Member profile
The Gretta Foundation (GF) was founded in 2007 in California, USA to provide in-country nursing education to impoverished persons living in disease-burdened nations while bolstering depleted healthcare workforces and improving patient care and outcomes. According to the WHO World Health Report 2006, Sub-Saharan Africa has 24% of the global disease burden but only 3% of the healthcare workforce worldwide. GF's work is currently focused in Africa.
Main activities
Per the World Health Organization, the global healthcare worker shortage is over 4.3 million. GF's mission is to increase the global “Nurseforce” by providing full nursing scholarships to impoverished persons living in disease-burdened nations. Nursing scholarship recipients, or Gretta Scholars, attend in-country nursing programs. In repayment for the scholarship assistance, graduating scholars serve for a predetermined period of time in their country’s clinics and hospitals.
Links to the health workforce crisis
GF's work encompasses most of the Millennium Development Goals as it works to increase the global nurseforce and bolster healthcare capacity and improve patient care and outcomes. In repayment for the scholarship, graduating scholars will serve in their country’s clinics and hospitals for a predetermined period of time, commensurate with each year of academic assistance. Nursing scholarships also empower women by providing the skills to enter into an indispensable and remunerative career. In-country provides an education that is more relevant to the nursing scholar’s community dynamics. Exacerbating the healthcare crisis is a problematic trend of the nursing “brain drain.” Due to higher pay and better workplace conditions, many skilled nurses are migrating from disease-burdened countries to more industrialized countries in the north. As a result, the loss of this essential human capital gravely affects healthcare availability and patient’s quality of care. In-country mitigates skill migration. Those educated in-country are less inclined to seek work elsewhere versus those educated out-of-country.
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