Swami Shree Tartam Jyotiji School of Nursing

GNM stands for General Nursing and Midwifery. It is a diploma-level nursing qualification, and it is the route most working nurses in Gujarat took into the profession. It covers the two halves its name suggests: general nursing, which is the care of patients across medicine, surgery, paediatrics and critical care, and midwifery, which is care through pregnancy, delivery and the period after it.

The course is taught in two parts that run together rather than one after the other. Classroom teaching covers anatomy, physiology, pharmacology, nutrition, microbiology and the principles of nursing practice. Clinical posting puts that teaching on a ward, under supervision, with real patients. A nursing course without the second half produces someone who has read about nursing, which is why where you train matters at least as much as what you are taught.

On qualifying, a GNM nurse registers with the state nursing council and can work as a staff nurse in a hospital, in community and public health settings, or in the specialist units they have trained in. It is also a recognised foundation for further nursing qualifications later.

Nursing is not a course people drift through. Three years of it, with clinical posting on real wards, asks something specific of a person, and it is kinder to think about that before enrolling than two terms in.

• Are you prepared to work shifts, including nights and festivals? Hospitals do not close.
• Can you be steady around blood, distress and death? These are not occasional parts of the job.
• Are you comfortable being corrected in public? Clinical supervision is direct, because the cost of politeness can be a patient.
• Can you commit three years, including the clinical posting, without a long break in the middle?
• Will your family support a job with hospital hours rather than office hours?
• Do you want the patient-facing part of medicine? Nursing is closer to the patient than almost any other role in a hospital.

None of this is meant to discourage. It is the honest version of a decision that recruitment material usually skips, and the people who answer yes to it tend to be the ones who finish.

1. Call the college office. 0261 2510050, and ask for the college rather than the hospital reception. They confirm what is open and what is required this year.
2. Ask about eligibility first. Before anything else, so you are not assembling documents for a course you are not yet eligible for.
3. Ask about fees and the hostel together. The two decide affordability jointly, and asking separately usually means calling twice.
4. Submit the application the way they tell you. By the route the college gives you, or by email to prannathhospital2@gmail.com.
5. Ask what the clinical posting looks like. It is the part of the course that decides what kind of nurse you become, and it is worth hearing described.