Becoming a Nurse in Norway

Published May 23, 2013

1 Post

Halla Everyone!

I currently work as a nurse in Medical Intensive Care in Texas and I'm moving to Norway this summer! :) Eventually I would like to be able to work as a nurse in Norway. I started the process of having my current nursing license verified by the Norwegian Registry of Health Personel (SAFH) several months ago. I've applied for the full "authorization" since I have my Bachelors of Science in Nursing. After weeks and weeks of collecting all the documents I needed to have for SAFH I mailed my package to Norway. About a month later I recieved and payed the fee. So -as I understand- SAFH should now be looking through my documents and working on getting the ball rolling!!

I am hoping that some of you other nurses with experience in recieving a Nursing License from Norway can share some of your experiences and impart some of your wisdom on me!

There are several things that I am wondering about! :geek:

From the time that you submitted your paid fee to SAFH, how long did it take to get your nursing license approved? The processing time that is listed on the website says six months, but my contact in Norway has called SAFH and rumor on the street is there is only one person processing applications and the turn around time is VERY backed up.
Did any of you not have your license approved on the first try? If so, what were the problems you ran into (like missing documents, or lack of enough clinical hours)?
If your license was not approved on your first submission, what did you do to have your nursing license approved the second time around, and how long was the turn around the second time?
Does anyone have experience with recieving a skilled worker visa without having a job offer at the time you applied for that visa?
Does anyone have experience with recieving a student visa to learn Norsk so that you can meet SAFH's language requirements?

Okay, I could go on, but I'll stop myself there! :cat: My next step is to figure out what visa I need to apply for and to take intensive language courses while my nursing license is being reviewed. I would love love love to hear back from any of you who have had experience with all of these things! I went to the Norwegian Embassy in Houston last week to see about turning in documents for my visa (long story short, I decided I should wait on turning anything in) but the person who worked there said he had never seen a nurse from the states trying to go to Norway to work. He said quite frankly, he didn't even know how my application would be handled since the situation was so unique!