Part-B: Post-Specific Syllabus - Nursing Officer
What Part-B tests
Part-B assesses nursing knowledge across fundamentals of nursing, anatomy and physiology, microbiology, pharmacology, medical–surgical nursing, community health nursing, obstetrics and gynaecology, paediatrics, psychiatric nursing, and nursing management/education. Questions often test the nursing process, infection control, drug calculation, normal values and emergency response.
Core rules and concepts
- Nursing process: assess, diagnose, plan, implement, evaluate. The diagnosis states the patient problem; interventions must be specific and measurable.
- Infection control: hand hygiene before and after patient contact, use of gloves and PPE, sterile technique for invasive procedures, safe sharps disposal. Medical asepsis reduces organisms; surgical asepsis eliminates them from an area.
- Pharmacology: check the “rights” - patient, drug, dose, route, time and documentation. Weight-based paediatric doses must be recalculated when the concentration changes.
- Vital signs: adult pulse is commonly 60–100/min, respirations 12–20/min, and oxygen saturation is usually above 94% on room air. Report trends, not isolated values.
- Community health: immunisation schedules, maternal and child care, communicable disease control, and referral pathways.
Worked example
Order: 500 mL of 0.9% sodium chloride over 4 hours. Drop factor: 20 gtt/mL. Find the drip rate.
Convert time to minutes: 4 × 60 = 240 minutes. Use gtt/min = (volume × drop factor) ÷ time in minutes = (500 × 20) ÷ 240 = 10,000 ÷ 240 = 41.67. Round to 42 gtt/min. The trap is using 4 hours directly instead of 240 minutes, or using the wrong drop factor.
Traps that cost marks
- Confusing medical asepsis with surgical asepsis.
- Calculating a paediatric dose by adult dose without weight or body-surface adjustment.
- Rounding a drip rate before converting hours to minutes.
- Choosing an intervention that is not within nursing scope or not measurable.
- Forgetting that normal values vary with age and clinical context.