Australian nurse wanting to take MS in Nurse Anesthesia

Nursing Students SRNA

Published

Specializes in Intensive Care, Medical-Surgical.

Hi all! I am a nurse currently working in Australia in one of the busiest and biggest ICUs in the country. I have realized that I want to pursue a long time dream of working in the US as a CRNA. However, I am not daydreaming and I know this will be very challenging for me. And CRNA schools are very competitive (needs high GPA and GRE, more than a year of ICU experience ideally surgical or CTICU, application essay, CRNA shadowing, difficult interview process etc.) If I passed my NCLEX, my next target is gain ICU employment in the US through E3 visa which is exclusively for Australian citizens. I also plan to take the CCRN exam, GRE and TOEFL (being a foreign nurse) which I know will all be difficult but that's why it all starts with dreaming and planning which is what I am doing now.

I know that if I luckily (only luckily) get into CRNA school, I will be studying full time for a maximum of 2.5 years. My question is can anyone suggest a pathway that I can take in terms of visa knowing that I don't have any green card and I am a foreign nurse. Do some schools sponsor an F1 visa to do the CRNA? Or can an E3 or even H1B be converted to F1 visa? Please shed some light on this. I am really confused. Any comments will be most welcome. Thank you so much!!

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