Speech by Dr Amy Khor, Senior Minister of State for Health, at the ILTC Manpower Development Awards 2016 Ceremony, 25 Aug

Dr Wong Kirk Chuan, AIC Deputy CEO,
Distinguished guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

Introduction

            Good morning. It is my pleasure to join you this morning at the fourth Intermediate and Long Term Care (ILTC) Manpower Development Awards Ceremony.

Urgency of Manpower Development in Community Care Sector

2.          Singapore’s population is ageing rapidly. We need to strengthen our ability to provide care in the home and community, to better support our seniors in ageing well. This is in line with our aim to move care beyond the hospital to home and community, so that we can meet growing needs in a cost-effective and sustainable manner beyond 2020. The Ministry of Health has been building up the capacity of the Community Care sector in anticipation of our future needs. The development of a future-ready Community Care sector needs to be supported by a team of healthcare workers who are dedicated and able to provide good quality care. 

Stepping Up Recruitment and Attraction Efforts

3.          The Community Care sector is a sunrise industry that offers a wide variety of jobs and good opportunities for individual development.  To build a pool of workers in this sector, we are reaching out to locals of all age groups.

4.          The Balaji Sadasivan Study Award was introduced in 2010 to attract young people keen to pursue a career in the sector. We have had 41 awardees since its inception, many of whom are physiotherapists and occupational therapists, and they have found the work in the sector both fulfilling and rewarding.

5.          One such awardee is 24-year old Ms Nur Atiqah Bte Sidek, who is also one of our emcees today. Ms Nur Atiqah is a physiotherapist at Ren Ci Hospital, who received the Award to support her studies in physiotherapy at Nanyang Polytechnic. Her desire to spend more time with her clients in rehabilitation led her to join the Community Care sector upon graduation. After working with elderly stroke patients, she was further motivated to upgrade her skills. Ms Nur Atiqah then applied for and was awarded the Intermediate and Long-Term Care-Upgrading Programme (ILTC-UP) to undertake her physiotherapy degree at the Singapore Institute of Technology (SIT). She graduated with First Class Honours last year and has since returned to Ren Ci Hospital to continue caring for elderly patients.  I hope that more young people like Ms Nur Atiqah will step forward to contribute to the Community Care sector.

6.          AIC has embarked on a suite of initiatives since last year to encourage more locals to join the sector. These include a branding campaign to increase awareness of the sector, regional job fairs and an Open House for jobseekers to meet employers in this sector. We have put in place a Community Care Discovery Programme to help interested jobseekers gain a better understanding of their prospective roles.  We have also designed a Community Care Traineeship Programme to help new support care staff pick up the required core skills. Through its efforts in the past year, AIC has attracted about 150 locals into the Community Care sector.  These locals come from a range of backgrounds and occupations such as school coordinators and retail assistants, and most of them are now working in the Community Care sector as therapy aides and healthcare attendants.

7.          Take for instance, Mr Lim Shew Chew, who is 53 this year. He participated in our job fair last year and after completing his training successfully, he is now working as a therapy aide with the Singapore Christian Home. Beyond assisting seniors in performing simple exercises, Mr Lim, who is fluent in Hokkien and Teochew, makes it a point to better understand those he serves, and plays the role of a motivator and counsellor occasionally. It encourages him greatly to know that he is making a positive impact on the lives of seniors whom he interacts with. We will continue to support employers in the hiring of local support care staff like Mr Lim.

8.          I am pleased to announce that to help the Community Care sector defray the costs of sending their newly recruited local support care staff for training, we will be fully funding the course fees for those taking part in the Community Care Traineeship Programme, an increase from the current subsidy level of 90%. In addition, there will be funding support to employers of $1,000 per month per newly recruited local support care staff during the period of training. We will also keep up efforts to target jobseekers in their job search nearer their homes through organising recruitment fairs near upcoming Nursing Homes and Senior Care Centres.

9.          We are also keen to encourage non-practising local nurses to return to nursing and join the Community Care sector. Mdm Sandra Foo is among the 19 nurses whom we have attracted back to nursing. Mdm Foo used to be a nurse in a polyclinic, but she left the profession six years ago to look after her young children. She was motivated to return to nursing after witnessing the dedicated care that her elderly mother received from the nurses at Assisi Hospice, which allowed her mother a dignified and peaceful passing after a two and half year battle with cancer. I am pleased to note that Mdm Foo is currently at the St Joseph’s Home undergoing on-the-job training, and will be joining the home upon her completion of the refresher course.

Developing Our Workforce for the Future

10.      Apart from getting more people to join the Community Care sector and equipping them with the necessary skills to do their work, it is also important that those who are already in the sector are not neglected but given an opportunity to upskill. The AIC Learning Institute offers a myriad of courses, and has facilitated over 29,000 training places to more than 130 organisations since 2010.

11.      AIC also administers two other study awards – the Social and Health Manpower Development Programme-ILTC (SHMDP-ILTC) and the Community Care GP Partnership Training Award. MOH Holdings also administers a Mid-Term Scholarship for Medical Social Work. Since 2002, more than 600 awards have been given out, of which over 100 recipients are receiving their awards today.

12.      Ms Noor Kesuma Binte Manap is one of our award winners. Wheelchair-bound after a spinal cord injury, she worked in a variety of positions before leaving the workforce to look after her young children. In 2009, she joined St. Andrew’s Community Hospital (SACH) as a Patient Service Assistant, providing financial counselling and managing part of the administrative team at its Day Rehabilitation Centre (DRC). This year, Ms Noor was awarded the ILTC-UP to pursue a Diploma in Business Administration. The course will equip her with skills to better lead her team in supporting the DRC’s expansion of its services and capacity. We wish Ms Noor all the best in her studies, and look forward to her completing her studies and coming back to work in the sector.

Employers Play an Important Role

13.      Our current achievements would not have been possible without the strong support of employers in the Community Care sector. They value staff development and view this as key to clinical excellence and quality service. Ren Ci Hospital, for instance, has supported close to 50 staff in their scholarship aspirations since 2010, including nurses, therapists, social workers, pharmacists and administrative staff.

14.      We have also seen the management of institutions “walking the talk” in leading their organisations in learning. Chief Executive Officer of Ling Kwang Home for Senior Citizens, Mr Dennis Tan, led a team visit to Australia to study care models for dementia. They will be adopting some of the practices observed as they plan for a new dementia ward at the Home. These include implementing a music connection programme as part of reminiscence therapy, and setting up a gallery displaying art done by residents.

Conclusion

15.      The Community Care sector offers many job and individual development opportunities to those passionate about serving the elderly. It is a sector that is demanding, but also deeply fulfilling. It is also a sector with much room for exciting new ideas to be implemented.

16.      The Ministry of Health, Agency for Integrated Care and the Community Care employers are committed to helping those working in this sector develop to their fullest potential, and will continue to work together on manpower development initiatives for the sector.

17.      On this note, I wish our awardees success in their studies, and a fulfilling career in this sector. Thank you.