Alberta nurses..what's your opinion?

[hugeviper]

I'm a registered nurse in the UK for 6 years and had recently applied for registration in Alberta. All my verifications have been completed recently only to be held unless I complete a competence assessment in Calgary. It seems that with the shortage of nurses there, your board of nursing is making it more difficult for foreign nurses to work there. Is taking and passing the CRNE not enough to practise nursing there? I have a bachelor's degree and more than 14 years experience as a registered nurse and I think this requirement is very insulting to all foreign nurses who wish to be registered there. It's ok if someone live near Alberta like the US but for European nurses would cost a fortune just to be eligible to take the CRNE. It was very frustrating and very disappointing as well as a waste of time of waiting, and money as well.

[loquacity]

I'm only a nursing student, but i do find that retarded.

perhaps if you were coming from a country with a more questionable or less u ifrom education system, but the UK is not in thta category. I'd alos firgure it would be easier in the commonwelath coutnries or at lteast all the major ones eg. Canada, UK, Australia.

well if you do come....welcome to alberta, thouhg i am australian born, but now living in edmonton AB, i want to move back down under. But there is still a HUGE labour shortage currently and only worse prospects for the future.

~Good luck with whatver you do

& why am i the only one who's responded.

[NotReady4PrimeTime, RN]

I have been puzzling over this for two day snow and think I've finally figured out why I've never heard anything about it before. It must be a clause in the newly passed and enacted Health Professions Act that has only included nursing since November. CARNA has been preparing us since 2002 for another offshoot of that, continuing competency. I agree that it's a vital part of practice to maintain and upgrade one's knowledge base, but the methods they've chosen to "facilitate and monitor" continuing competency in this province is a bit of a joke. It's all anecdotal and self-assessed, with pretty loose standards of documentation. We're still in our "practice" year, the one where we're supposed to get used to doing the assessment and documentation. Only time will tell if it's going to work.

I don't know what to tell you about the whole Substantively Equivalent Competence thing. I agree they're throwing up roadblocks and it's counterproductive. I'll ask around and see if anyone has more to say about this.