advice PLEASE on UK-US nursing move!

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Specializes in orthopaedic, neurosurgery.

Hi there, so after a couple of days trawling the forums, I think I'm beginning to get an tiny idea of what this whole process is about. Not easy at all, is it?! I'm really hoping that someone can help verify if I'm on the right track. Here's my understanding so far.....

The UK degree is more specialised than the US degree meaning that clinical and theoretical hours need to be made up in order to meet requirements to sit the NCLEX-RN. These requirements are set by the BON of each state and it is only when you have met the academic requirements that you will be given permission by a state to take the NCLEX-RN test. Right so far?

Questions:

1) are the requirements for each state’s BON pretty similar? I have the breakdown for Vermont (taken from their website), which is as follows….

Adult Nursing: theory 75hrs, clinical 200hrs

Maternal/infant nursing: theory 30hrs, clinical 40 hrs

Paeds: theory 30hrs, clinical 40 hrs

Psych/mental health: theory 30, clinical 40

A&P (including lab): 80hrs

Microbiology (including lab): 40 hrs

Humanities: 40hrs

Social and behavioural sciences: 40 hrs

2) is it a question of writing to each state’s BON to try and get the breakdown of hours required? Does anyone one know which state's required hours correlate most closely with a UK degree (i.e with one year of common foundation programme and 2 years adult nursing branch)? In other words, are there any states which are 'easier' (for want of a better word) for UK graduates to apply to?

Once I have established this, I guess the only way to actually find out SPECIFICALLY how my hours compare (and thereby discover exactly which areas I need to cover and how many hours) is to bite the bullet, pay CGFNS the $335 to get my transcript sent and translated to the BON I choose. Off the top of my head, I’m guessing that I will definitely have to make up hours in paeds, however, I’m not sure if what we did at uni in terms of mental health/learning disability, and health visiting modules would count towards the psych requirement and maternal/infant nursing requirement. I guess it’s all a matter of how our UK transcripts are translated, isn’t it? E.g my uni tells me that we didn’t do microbiology, and therefore it wouldn’t appear on my UK transcript. However my (American) husband looked at the course content and said that parts of what we studied in A&P were microbiology as they would define it in the U.S. There’s no point in guessing, is there, really? So, I think it’d prob just be better to pay CGFNS at this stage, right?

A few questions on this:

a) Do we only need to have details of the nursing degree sent via CGFNS to the BON? Are you supposed to include anything from high school? What about previous degrees? I have a BA from another university, which may help cover the “humanities” requirement and studied A&P at an accredited massage therapy school in NYC in the 90's, which may help me out with the microbiology part….how many sources can you put on the CES form? I think it might be 2, but what happens if you have a few sources of education from which to draw? Also, am I right in thinking that I can have the credentials sent to two different BONs?

b) Will the 2 BONs I have the information sent to, then contact me and inform me exactly what I’m missing or would I need to pay the extra $75 to CGFNS for a duplicate copy of each? Does this process really take upwards of 6 months? ( I've seen a few reports on the forums that CGFNS are kind of unreliable but they seem to be the one credentialing agency that the BONs prefer, is that right?)

c) Once I have established exactly what I’m missing, would I then start looking for ways to make these theoretical and clinical hours up?

d) Has anyone out there found a way to do this in the UK? I've had a few false starts on this....looks like a few years ago Brighton Uni ran some kind of make-up course but this is no longer running. Looks like the problem might be in getting the accredited clinical hours. Anyone heard of a current solution to this?

e) Alternatively, have any Brits found a way to make up hours in the USA? I’ve seen on the forums here that people talk about being a ‘guest student’ and being able to do individual modules to cover the shortfall in hours…..anyone actually got any first hand experience or knowledge about this? Am I right in thinking that such modules would have to be gained through a university nursing programme due to the supervised clinical components required, not through, for example, a community college?

If/when I ever do get the hours made up, do I then re-apply to CGFNS and get them to send the updated info to the BONs (I guess this has to be done within a year as a “Professional Report Reprocess Application”in order to pay only $150 instead of making an entirely new application)?

If the BON / CGFNS tells me I that I do meet the requirements, do I then have to apply to take the NCLEX first, followed by an application to the BON for PTT or do I apply for PTT from the BON before applying to NCLEX?

Ok, so I know that's all probably as clear as mud, but if any of you can verify that I'm on the right track here, I'd really appreciate it. I really don't want to set off down the wrong path and waste money and, more importantly, valuable time, seeing as this process will probably be torturously long and terrifyingly expensive already, lol!

Thanks a million!

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Specializes in Acute Care, Rehab, Palliative.

Do you have your Green Card so you can work in the US?

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Specializes in orthopaedic, neurosurgery.

I'm married to an American and actually have a social security number (lived in US for 9 years). I had to give up my green card because I'd been out of the US too long to meet residency requirements (due to studying nursing in the UK) but will be able to re-apply through my husband, so immigration shouldn't be too much of an issue.

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Sciences are only good for 5 years. You will need to take Micro and A&P.

As far as hours for other states, I think those hours are very low. For example for an ADN Medical Surgical is close to 1000 hours. There are no states that don't include Medical Surgical, Peds, Maternity, Pysch and OB. That maybe ok for Vermont, but other states will vary.

Use to be a community college would allow foreign students to make up hours, but with classes so full I have not seen that allowed in a long time.

Good Luck.

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Sciences are only good for 5 years. You will need to take Micro and A&P.

As far as hours for other states, I think those hours are very low. For example for an ADN Medical Surgical is close to 1000 hours. There are no states that don't include Medical Surgical, Peds, Maternity, Pysch and OB. That maybe ok for Vermont, but other states will vary.

Use to be a community college would allow foreign students to make up hours, but with classes so full I have not seen that allowed in a long time.

Good Luck.

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Hi. Joining this thread rather late, I'm a UK-trained nurse who got my US RN licence earlier this year. However, I trained from 1989-1992, when the training was more generalist, so I didn't have the issue of having to make up missing modules. I can answer a few of your questions: a)You do need CGFNS to send your details to your nominated BON/s. Some BONs require high school info & others don't. I think there's a website that provides this info. And in my case they weren't interested in my previous degree which was a Master's degree in English from an American state university. b)You can phone the BON in question to see if they have your info from CGFNS & if it looks as if it meets requirements (at least this is what I did & they were very helpful). And if CGFNS take longer than the stated time once your transcripts are in, you can phone & chase them. I think it's supposed to be 10 weeks, not 6 months. (Hint: You need to phone within 30 seconds of office opening time, otherwise you won't get through!) And lastly: once you meet the test reqs, you apply to the BON for PTT at the same time as you register with Pearsonvue & pay your NCLEX test fees. Oh yes - & incidentally a lot of states require you to take & pass the CGFNS exam before you sit the NCLEX.

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Specializes in Medical and general practice now LTC.
incidentally a lot of states require you to take & pass the CGFNS exam before you sit the NCLEX.

Only a few states now require CGFNS exam as a requirement, most just require CES which is evaluation of transcripts

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