Healthcare | Sunday 16 August, 2015 6:03 am |

The Ministry of Health has decided to award scholarships to Saudi students in an attempt to provide approximately 20,000 jobs in the health sector, which is in high demand.

The decision follows a previous agreement between the Health and Education ministries, local media has reported. 
The Health Ministry has clearly identified the areas of specialization that require fulfilling and intends to use the scholarships as an incentive to attract Saudi students to the field. Hence, it has refrained from providing scholarships to fields that are self-sufficient and operated by Saudis. 
The ministry has particularly focused on specialization in the nursing field, as it wants to improve the generic mechanisms of nursing to an advanced level.
The scholarships for the specialization include undergraduate programs, general nursing, respiratory health care, speech pathology, occupational therapy, prosthetics, foot care, cardiac ischemia, ambulance and emergencies, clinical nutrition, clinical pharmacy, nuclear therapy and radiation protection.
The undergraduate diploma provides specializations in adult intensive care, child intensive care nursing, theater medical operations and emergency medicine.

The specializations provided by the master’s degrees include disaster management, biomedical engineering, clinical psychology, ambulance and emergencies, clinical nutrition, physical therapy, occupational health, international health, nuclear and occupational therapy, health informatics, speech and communication, patient safety, medical sciences, critical care nursing, emergency, nursing and infection control. 
Associate degrees, also provided by the scholarships, include specializations such as clinical pharmacy, intensive care medicine, emergency medicine, pediatrics, obstetrics and gynecology.

The doctoral degree will cover scholarships for specializations of occupational therapy and clinical nutrition.