What are the minimum Clinical hours for nursing students? SC asks Indian Nursing Council

This direction was given by the top court bench comprising of Justices KM Joseph and Hrishikesh Roy while they were considering a plea by KVM College of Nursing, which challenged the denial of affiliation by the Kerala University of Health Sciences (KUHS).

Although Indian Nursing Council had submitted affidavit regarding the matter, the bench noted that the requirement of minimum hours of clinical training was not mentioned in it. Directing the INC to file an affidavit before March 28, the bench directed, "In course of hearing of this case, the response from the Indian Nursing Council was required on the minimum hours of clinical training that the student-nurses are expected to undertake either in the parent or in the affiliated hospital, to achieve the norms applicable all across the country. The affidavit which has been filed does not address this particular aspect on the required hours of training. Accordingly, the affidavit to this effect be filed on or before 28th March, 2022."

The main case concerned KVM College of Nursing, which lost its provisional affiliation from Kerala University of Health Sciences to conduct Nursing Colleges and Nursing Schools for the academic year 2020-2021.

Such a decision was taken by the University on the basis of the inspection conducted by the University on 18.12.2019 and re-inspection conducted on 17.02.2020. During the inspection, various deficiencies, including deficiency in bed occupancy, were noted by the Inspection Commission and after considering those reports, the Scrutiny

Committee found that the inpatient strength in the parent hospital was not sufficient to grant continuation of provisional affiliation for the academic year 2020-2021.

However, challenging this decision of the University, the college approached the Kerala High Court, which rejected the plea and held that the "no interference is required to the action taken by the University to reject the continuation of provisional affiliation for the academic year in question."

Challenging the High Court's order, the college finally approached the Supreme Court. When the matter came up for hearing before the Supreme Court bench on March 23, the counsel for KUHS argued that if the nursing students of each batch, are to undertake their clinical training in the affiliated hospital in order to get the required 420 hours of training, a student has to undergo at least 14 hours of training on each day, which may be practically impossible as the affiliated hospital is located at some distance from the Nursing Institute. He also pointed out that the college in question also catered to the nursing students, from other institutes.

At this outset, the bench noted that even though a response was sought from the Indian Medical Council regarding the minimum required clinical training hours, the affidavit filed by INC didn't address this issue.

Directing the Council to file an affidavit by March 28, the matter got listed for March 29.