RCSI conferred 182 students with degrees in Medicine, Pharmacy and Physiotherapy as well as postgraduate awards at its conferring ceremony today. 176 Nursing students were also conferred at the event.

The first cohort of graduates from the International School of Healthcare Management’s Masters Programme in Quality in Healthcare (MSc) were conferred .The MSc in Quality in Healthcare is the first programme of its kind in this country and is offered to all staff working in the healthcare sector including doctors, managers, nurses, other clinical specialists and administrators.

Pauline Joyce, Director of Academic Affairs in the School of International Healthcare Management, said: “It is particularly timely, with the establishment of the Health Information and Quality Authority, to have healthcare professionals educated to Master’s level in quality. The focus on improving standards for a better healthcare service needs professionals to be educated to a level, which gives them the skills, confidence and awareness necessary to identify, and implement evidence based quality and safety in healthcare.”

The first-ever graduates from the MSc in Healthcare Management were also conferred at the event. Gerorgina Gethin from the Faculty of Nursing became the first graduate to have been conferred with a Degree of Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Nursing at RCSI.

Professor Seamus Cowman, Head of the RCSI School of Nursing and Midwifery, said: “This is a very proud day and important step for Nursing education and research at RCSI. We are delighted to see clinically based nurses achieve the highest academic accolade and we hope that many more will follow in Georgina’s footsteps in the years to come.”