Reform of nursing education: Students should receive remuneration in the future

24.05.2023 17:08

On May 24th, the Federal Cabinet passed a draft law to strengthen higher education nursing training and to make it easier to recognize foreign nursing qualifications. According to this, nursing students should in future receive appropriate remuneration for the entire duration of their studies. In addition, recognition procedures for foreign nursing specialists will be standardized and simplified.

Federal Minister of Health Prof. Karl Lauterbach: “In order to get more young people interested in the nursing profession again, they not only need good working conditions but also good training conditions. University nursing education plays an important role in the further development and upgrading of the nursing profession. Students should also have the financial freedom to be able to concentrate fully on their studies and not have to work part-time. Therefore, nursing students should receive appropriate remuneration for the entire duration of their studies.”

Federal Minister for Family Affairs Lisa Paus: “Nursing staff trained at the university strengthens the quality of care. However, only a few students are currently taking up nursing studies and every second place remains unfilled. We want to change that with the Nursing Studies Strengthening Act. We are making nursing studies more attractive because in the future students will receive remuneration for the entire duration of their studies. The training institutions also benefit: as with vocational training, their costs are also reimbursed through training funds. In this way, we promote the institutions’ willingness to train more students.”

The draft provides for the following regulations in detail:

• Nursing students receive appropriate remuneration for the entire duration of their studies. At the same time, transitional regulations are intended to ensure that those who have started university nursing training based on the previous regulations also receive training allowance for the remaining period of study without having to reorganize their studies.
• The financing of the practical part of university nursing training should be integrated into the existing financing system for vocational nursing training. The university nursing training will be designed as a dual course of study and a training contract will also be provided in the future.
• Digitalization, gender medicine aspects and the possibility of stays abroad should be given greater consideration in nursing training.
• Recognition procedures for foreign nursing specialists will be standardized and simplified, in particular through federal law regulating the scope and required form of the documents to be submitted. In addition, the possibility should be created to forego a comprehensive equivalence test in favor of a knowledge test or an adaptation course.
• In addition, the legal framework for professional nursing training will be further improved and adapted to current developments, for example in the area of digitalization.
• In addition to the current job titles “nursing specialist” or “nursing specialist”, a gender-neutral job title “nursing specialist” can be chosen in the future. This applies accordingly to people who already have permission to use the professional title.