French nurse student needs some informations

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Hi,

I'm a french nurse student. I need some information about being a nurse in autralia.

In one word all the difference between being a nurse in France and in Australia.

Thanks.

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Specializes in Education, FP, LNC, Forensics, ED, OB.

Hello and welcome to allnurses.com

While I do not have any information for you, others will come along and help.

We hope you enjoy the site.

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It difficult for one to answer your question without working as a nurse in both countries.

Registered nurses in Australia are educated as generalists. That means not specialising in any area of nursing. It is a 3 year degree with an expected graduate year at a hospital at 4th year. They have to pay back the government their university fees once their wages reach 45,000.

Nurses in public hospitals have autonomous roles and need to have good assessment skills as they are the one who call in doctors when their patients are unwell. Doctors have been very well educated these days and usually consider nurses opinions on the holistic care of their patients.

RN's in Australia are expected to do most things on general wards, from hygiene needs to starting and mixing IV's depending on how big the health facilities.

Maternity nursing is strictly a midwife domain, which nurses can do post graduate to become dual registered, midwife and nurse.

Many nurses these days go on to do Master/diploma/certificate in their chosen speciality whether it be general acute, aged care, ICU etc.

Nursing is considered a very trusted profession by the public when polls are taken and are usually the top profession for this along with para medics. Well above lawyers and used care salesmen and above the medical profession.

Most public hospitals have nurse patient ratios- meaning - in victoria firsthand, day shift there are 4 patients to every nurse in acute Melbourne hospitals, afternoon shift their is 6 to one nurse and night shift there is 8-10 patients per nurse.

We have a very strong union that supports all aspects of nursing - wages, education.

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Thank you fo your answer,

In France we are educated as generalist too. It's a 3 years degree with 1 year of internships included. After graduate, we can be specialised in pediatrics or being anesthesist nurse...

We have also autonomous role and a role with doctor precription.

Can you tell me the salary, the working time... ?

Thanks and sorry for my bad english.

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Specializes in Psych.

I am a nurse who has worked in Australia. Your first challenge will be passing an English test Nursing and Midwifery Board of Australia - FAQ: English language skills registration standard

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If i might add, the French degree seems very similar to the Australian one. I am a final year nursing student having done my entire degree here in France but I was raised in Ireland.

We do 3 years of college, including 60 weeks of placement in short term care, long term care, mental health and "lieu de vie" which includes schools, companies, colleges etc; minimum 5 weeks in each of these domains. So for example my short term care has been nephrology and ophtalmic surgery but oph is the only expérience I have in surgery i have had. (I have a 9week placement left to do and then I'm done. So we don't all do the same placement, some may have more experience in certain domains than others.

We have 3 specialties all of which are now masters (very recent development) pediatric nursing, anesthetic nursing (for in the operating theatre or working in an ambulance) or scrub nurse (surgeons aide, circulating nurse, instrument nurse etc). There are also many many DU (university diplomas) you can do but often you have to pay them yourself, they result in added responsibility in your workplace but not always a higher salary to go with it.

We we work à pretty strict 35 hour week either in 7.5 hour day shifts (either morning or afternoon) or 10-hour night shifts, or on 12-hour day/night shifts, depending on the ward. We have a strict four weeks min of holidays per year plus 13 public holidays (double pay if you're workin!!) and plenty of catchup days due to working more than 7 hours per day and therefore more than the required 35hours per week.. Not sure if I make sense? The salary differs greatly from nurse to nurse as younger nurses for example often work a lot of weekends and bank holidays for the extra pay, but then again more experienced nurses work less of those days but have a higher pay grade. What is the pay like in Australia?

i am looking forward to working abroad in a year or two and I am most interested in working in the emergency dept. I have 5weeks experience in the cardio/Uro/respi department of our ED and am going back for 6 weeks in the new ED which includes dig/neuro and trauma. I was wondering how competitive it is to work in the ED in Australia? And if extra training is needed in addition to my general nursing degree and experience in the ED(I plan to work there after my graduation in France before moving abroad)?

we also have very active nurse unions and student nurse unions (FNESI nationally and local nursing student unions).

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