Question about Nursing shortage

suehp · Jun 1, 2003

Yeah, we have a nurse shortage here in the UK and in my area we have been employing S.African Nurses and from the Phillipines too.

It has been going on for a while too.

Sue

Hellllllo Nurse, BSN, RN · Jun 1, 2003

There is a nursing shortage all over the world.

The richer, developed nations are leaving some poorer countries high and dry by luring their nurses away.

Rocknurse, MSN, APRN, NP · Jun 1, 2003

If the USA has a nursing shortage then why has it taken a year and a half to process my visa??? I'm still waiting although I am ready and able to travel right now.

Here in the UK we have a severe nursing shortage. In fact there are only 3 of us on my unit out of 50 that are actually English. My boss had to travel to India and Singapore to recruit.

Hellllllo Nurse, BSN, RN · Jun 1, 2003

Many foreign nurses working in The U.S. have corporate health care employers who sponser them to come to The U.S. to work..

They get in pretty quickly.

I don't think it's a good practice, though. Many of these nurses are obligated to work at a reduced wage for years for the employer that brought them in. Also, many of these nurses cannot speak english, and have been educated to standards that don't measure up. The hospital where I worked almost literally let them get away w/ murder. They have signed contracts, and mgmt is loathe to lose the cheap labor.

I worked on a unit where I was labled the "whiney white nurse" because I spoke up about unsafe working conditions and poor/horrible pt care.

The foreign nurses at that hospital would never rock the boat or disagree w/ mgmt in any way.

(This is what I observed in my experiences. I am not generalizing about all foreign nurses. I have known a few excellent ones. Please, no flames).

NancyRN · Jun 2, 2003

We all know there's not a shortage of nurses. There is a shortage of nurses who are willing to work in sweat shop conditions.

Home Health Columnist / Guide · Jun 2, 2003

Here are some interesting articles on the subject:

Global Reach of the Nursing Shortage

https://allnurses.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=18890&highlight=nursing+shortage

National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN) Position Statement: Foreign (International) Nurse Immigration

http://www.ncsbn.org/public/news/res/G1Immig1.pdf

From ANA: Immigration and the Nursing Workforce

http://nursingworld.org/gova/federal/legis/107/immigr.htm

Uniform Core Licensure Requirements

A Supporting Paper, July 1999

http://www.ncsbn.org/public/regulation/nursing_practice_licensing.htm

International council tackles universal issues

Nursing shortages, poverty, standards of care bedevil health-care systems worldwide

http://health.workopolis.com/servlet/Content/rprinter/20010627/issues

World Health Organization: Trade in health services

http://www.who.int/bulletin/pdf/2002/bul-2-E-2002/80(2)158-163.pdf

Nursing shortage imperils patients

http://www.usatoday.com/news/healthscience/health/2001-06-27-nursing-shortage.htm

An Opinion: The Future of Nursing

http://www.nurspeak.com/tools/articles/future.htm

Excerpt from June 27, 2001 Congressional Testimony by the ANA on the subject:

"Immigration

The ANA and I have deep concerns about the use of immigration as a means to address the emerging nursing shortage. As you are well aware, Chairman Durbin, immigration is the standard "answer" proposed by employers who have difficulty attracting American nurses to work in their facilities. We have been down this road many times before without success. There are a number of problems with increasing the immigration of foreign-trained nurses, following are just a few issues:

The influx of foreign-trained nurses only serves to further delay debate and action on the serious workplace issues that continue to drive American nurses away from the profession. As I mentioned earlier, a Presidential task force called to investigate the last major nursing shortage developed a list of recommendations. These 16 recommendations, released in December, 1988, are still very relevant today - they include issues such as the need to adopt innovative nurse staffing patterns, the need to collect better data about the economic contribution that nurses make to employing organizations, the need for nurse participation in the governance and administration of health care facilities, and the need for increased scholarships and loan repayment programs for nursing students. Perhaps if these recommendations were ever implemented we would not be here today. Certainly, we will be here in the future if they are ignored.

There are serious ethical questions about recruiting nurses from other countries when there is a world-wide shortage of nurses. The removal of foreign-trained nurses from areas such as South Africa, India, and the Caribbean deprives their home countries of highly trained health care practitioners upon whose skills and talents their countries heavily rely.

In addition, immigrant nurses are too often exploited because employers know that fears of retaliation will keep them from speaking up. There are numerous, disturbing examples from our experience with the expired H-1A nurse visa. In fact, several cases came from Illinois. The INS Chicago District issued a $1.29 million fine against FHC Enterprises, Inc. for 645 immigration document violations. FHC, Inc. fraudulently obtained 225 H-1A visas which were used to employ Filipino nurses as lower-paid nurse aides ($6.50 per hour) instead of as registered nurses ($12.50 per hour). The Catholic Archdiocese of Chicago agreed to pay $50,000 in fines and $384,700 in back wages to 99 Filipino nurses who were underpaid. In Kansas, 66 Filipino nurses were awarded $2.1 million to settle a discrimination case in which the Filipino nurses were not paid the same wage rate as U.S.-born registered nurses at the same facility. These are just a few of the cases that have come to light over the last decade........"

http://nursingworld.org/gova/federa...001/govaref.htm

Aussie contingent have posted @allnurses:

https://allnurses.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=232437#post232437

Here in Australia there is also a nursing shortage........young people straight from school are opting for the IT fields, and any other career that pays more money......and nurses are leaving in droves.

There is a hospital here in the state of Victoria, that are offering new employees free round the world trips!!

see: http://todaytonight.com.au/stories/315882.html

http://www.nswnurses.asn.au/news_media/nutable_report.pdf

General search:

https://allnurses.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=176710#post176710

Hellllllo Nurse, BSN, RN · Jun 2, 2003

NRSKarenRN,

Great post, great info.

Thanks!

Peeps Mcarthur · Jun 2, 2003

Buy low. Sell high.

A basic principle of business.

The more that profit excedes your overhead, the less your business decisions are based on morals:devil:

To some nurses somewhere, $6.50/hr and living in America while having such expenses as rent, transportation, etc, would appear to them to be a golden opportunity. Since double that wage is still dirt cheap for the profit that a nurse can earn for a company($12.50/hr is still ridiculous no matter where), the companies look pretty darn good to the shareholders if they can show that the main profit center costs them less than houskeeping!

In the case of the $12.50/hr nurses, I would venture that housekeeping staff is probably making........oh, $8-$9/hr. Think about what a skilled nurse under duress of being deported could rake in for your company........................could probably get them to do some of the housekeeping duties too;)

Why wouldn't people be outraged by this?

Because the companies that do it claim that it's to ease the nursing shortage:roll They claim that there are not enough nurses to fill opennings(created by lay-offs and elimination of positions) here in the U.S. when there are actualy more licensed RN's than there are openings. What that really means is that there are not enough nurses willing to work for $6.50/hr.

Then there are good people like Rocknurse, wanting to come here and wondering why, with the shortage and all, that there aren't recruiters ringing her phone off the hook.

Rocknurse, MSN, APRN, NP · Jun 2, 2003

Well I certainly wouldn't work for $6.50 an hour, I can tell you! I wouldn't even work for $12.50. What an insult. I get over $30 an hour now, and that's in London. i want at least that if not more, considering I have 13 years experience in CCU, ER and ICU.

Peeps Mcarthur · Jun 2, 2003

Certainly Rocknurse,

I'm sure the hospitals could turn a nice profit paying you even more in light of the procedures you could perform(which is your value to them).X procedures, documented by Y nurses =profit/

- charges disallowed by insurance.

I think that a nurse's experience only relates to management in terms of this equation unfortunately, since they earn a bonus for a certain amount of profit gain over the same quarter from last year.

However.........................That being said, there are groups called angencies here that get contracted to provide staffing for hospital managers that have either cut staffing so badly, or abused the staff in such a manner that they can't hire people fast enough to plug all the leaks. An agency that is contracted to find ICU nurses would not be speculating in the cheap labor market, I would think, because there is more liability than it's worth.

Why don't you get an agency to help you with your visa? I don't know if that's an option, but it would seem to me that that is where you need to look for the money you deserve.

Rocknurse, MSN, APRN, NP · Jun 2, 2003

Thanks Peeps, but I am already with an agency. They are doing fine, but the delay is not their fault, it's the fault of the US immigration service who are delaying things so excessively that I am forced to wait a year and a half for a visa. There was supposed to be a new law passed that expedited nursing visas but it never happened. So...I sit here and wait while you guys are short-staffed!