Sapping Philippines' Health Care System

Gist of the ever popular argument: Foreign nurses in America is the primary reason why working/pay conditions are getting worse and is not gonna get better... WHO allows this to happen?

You cannot tell running waters to stop running not until the tap is turned off... or it ran dry..

BLAME...BLAME...
Cuss..cuss..cuss.. it's not good for the heart..

I AM VERY SURE, EVEN IF A DREAM COME TRUE OF NURSES IN AMERICA WILL HAVE GREAT PAY WITHOUT A FOREIGNER IN SIGHT, CONTENTMENT WILL NEVER EXIST.... because the nature of the job is always stressful...a channel is always sought to drain it out... and human nature --- will always want..

u cant call us to have 3rd world kinda nursing education...well, the authors of our textbooks lyk Saunders, Luckmann & Sorensen, Barbara Bates, Doenges, etc. are from your world...

for the next 10-20 years, this argument will continue to linger...lest a constitution will be held..

unite american nurses, and urge your government to stop giving visas to foreign nurses w/c takes 1-2yrs to process.. or better yet, close ur boarders.. and all ur problems will be sorted in a whiz!!

a new group of suckers from ABC Community college....

hmmmm... interesting group of people....

Unfortunately this saga has been ongoing for at least 35 years. My own son-in-law who is only 30 has exactly the same problem in the computer industry. As America continues to outsource the majority of it's work and the insource is comprised of many immigrants, I wonder just when the melting pot will melt.
Education in Europe is basically free and many more young people have university educations than young people here. What will that mean say in another 25 years???? Hy husband's neices and nephews are Italian and they almost all have university educations that their parents and them did not have to pay an arm and a leg for.
OR will the world finally become just one united world?? As we all do the same thing here, there and everywhere??

I'm a little confused.

from what i've seen in the posts, it's 1) bad pay
2) deplorable working conditions/ high patient-to-nurse ratio

1)bad bay:
isn't much more than a simple damand and supply issue (especially since we're dealing with rising health care costs). The demand (accdg to sources) has been growing for years and will continue to grow. If it were a simple issue as demand and supply; wouldn't we have seen surges in salaries already.

2) patient-to-nurse ratio
considering that one-third of new nurses going into the workforce is foreign-born (accdg to another source); wouldn't the halt of immigrating nurses even strain the patient-to-nurse ratio even more?
The alternatives wouldn't be as quick to implement

And there was one post saying that filipinos are unpatriotic.

Consider this. Isn't limiting the influx of needed nurses cause either increase in patient-to-nurse ratio or in some cases hospitals being shut down. Causing patients or would-be-patients to be even more endangered. Isn't endangering people's lives in order for better pay more unpatriotic?

after all, doesn't nursing put the needs of the community ahead of the good of its individual members?

I do not agree. Many nurses in the US feel that there is no nursing shortage. In fact, US Dept of Labor statistics bear this out. US nurses leave nursing because of lack of respect and poor working conditions. But, because so many foreign nurses are will to come in and take their places, US companies do not have to address these problems.

Check the link and read the thread to see what many nurses in the US think.

http://allnurses.com/forums/f195/rea...-247767-4.html

One would think so, but this is not the case. Ratios are determined by hospital administration- based on how many nurses they are willing to pay for for a certain number of patients. Staffing levels are not detemined by how many nurses are available to work. When admin feels there are too many nurses on duty, they send them home or float them to other areas. Short staffing is done on purpose, in order to save money.

California manadated nurse to pt ratios. This ended up actually attracting many nurses to California to work. I was just reading an article which states the ratios have attracted hundreds of thousands of nurses to Calif.

I don't blame them at all for seeking a better life.

However, both countries are losing. Nursing abroad should be an opportunity, not a dependence. I hope that both of our countries can regain their healthcare systems.

I think it's an every nurses dream here in the philippines to work abroad especially in the US.We believe that what we are earning here in the phillippines for one month we can have it for just a week there! And they cannot blame us (the philippine government) to leave for good just to give our family especially our children a better future an also a better chance to have a better life ahead.

Well, I for one am glad your mad. Here in the US we have the right to talk about anything though , so grin and hold on. At least your showing that you do have a sense of national pride. After reading the article, I wondered too. Like, "Why don't they care about their own health care system if they are health care workers?". They seem to be in this for the money. Even though your reasons go far deeper than that and I don't sense your greedy or lacking pride in being from the Philippines. The article does stress that the problem is a serious lethargy there that even doctors don't see being remedied in their lifetimes. Yes I am the offspring of immigrants that have fought from 1776 to present. My family came here for the same reasons your family came here.

Another reason why I am glad your offended when you sense we question your national pride, is the other influx of immigrants from the South. Those immigrants are mostly illegal, openly disdainful of our laws, language and the constitution. They have bribed and coheres or representatives into abandoning us and representing them for their 12 million illegal votes that make the whole election process fraudulent and destroy the Preamble to the Constitution. Those from the South who have our blessing of liberty to ourselves and our posterity threatened, infected the general welfare, made our common defense look ridiculious, and betraying our trust. They have our government turn their heads for a few dollars when we say we are being invaded and proved to the world our constitution is a joke and our representatives represent corrupt lovers of self. Well you ARE welcome here and I just think illigal snots in our midst has tainted our view on all immigrants and maybe your ability to see our appreciation. I appreciate the Philipinoe nurses I have worked with over the past 22 years, but I worry when the article sites the pass rates of the school and the decline of the product quality in the name of profit. Remember we are health care providers and that is our focus. If we are not careful corruption could destroy us all.

I think health workers of every country should understand each other rather than tend to blame. I am not yet a nurse, I am planning to go to nursing school in the Philippines. My brother is a doctor and works in the USA. My sister works in a pharmacy in Canada. They work in the developed countries because the pay is better. For me, it is okay to work either in a poor country or a more developed country. My belief is that all countries, whether rich or poor must devote a bigger appropriation to social services. That means more money to build new community colleges and pay nurse teachers a more decent salary. That means more socialized coverage of medicines for people who really cannot afford rising health costs. That means more budget for preventive health care and public health care education. Many of the ailments that burden the care system can be traced to poor public awareness campaigns on malnutritious junk food that breed diabetes and cardiovascular diseases, plus the wasteful and pollutive businesses that produce the junk food and other petroleum-based disposeable amenities like plastic wrap and mountains of water bottles and hormone-laced beef and dioxins in electronic wastes.

My personal dream is to become some kind of a community nurse, where I can be a part of a community-based health management system that supports barefoot health campaigners. I have seen some systems before in Manila where jobless moms were encouraged to be part time health educators. Of course, many would say it is hard to mobilize nonprofessionals to maintain a modicum of dedication to keep them interested in serving poor villagers like themselves, but hey, health care professionals such as nurses and doctors can try to think of another possible world of vibrant volunteer networks. I hope I can meet other dreamers like myself. Thank you for giving my opinions some thought!