New Law for nurse without Immigration???

[pinguina]

is this is the end for the nurse immigration to the u.s?\

suzzane what do you think will happen in the near future?

durbin introduces legislation to ease nationwide nursing shortage

wednesday, september 19, 2007

[washington, dc] – u.s. senator dick durbin [d-il] introduced legislation late last night to address our nation’s nursing shortage. the nurse training and retention act of 2007 (s.2064) would help create a pipeline to nursing for incumbent ancillary healthcare workers who wish to advance their careers and for current nurses who wish to receive specialty training and advanced degrees to become nurse faculty.

“everyone depends on nurses for quality patient care, yet the healthcare system in america lacks an adequate supply of nurses,” said durbin. “by 2020, the shortage could exceed one million. we have the opportunity to stop this trend and start equipping our hospitals with the nursing workforce needed to provide exceptional care. today’s legislation proposes a new, innovative program to address this critical need and build on the untapped resource of the current healthcare workforce.”

today’s legislation would ensure an adequate supply of nurses and promote high-quality patient care by awarding department of labor grants to programs that offer opportunities for a career ladder for current healthcare workers and nurses to receive specialty training and higher education.

“patients will receive better quality of care when we invest in training the next generation of nurses to fill the nursing shortage." said cathy glasson, rn, president of nurse alliance of seiu, “this legislation puts incumbent healthcare workers on track to become nurses—and no one is better prepared to become nurses than those already working in healthcare.”

durbin noted that the need for nurses is growing, but our ability to train more nurses is not keeping up. in illinois, the number of qualified applicants being denied admission to nursing schools is growing. from 2002 through 2003, there were 502 qualified students rejected from illinois nursing schools. last year, there were 1,900 students turned away because of lack of faculty and resources. and yet, in spite of the increasing number of eligible nursing school applicants, illinois could be facing a shortage of over 21,000 nurses by 2020 because of a lack of nursing faculty.

additionally, healthcare organizations see several advantages in training healthcare workers to become nurses because they require less time in orientation than new workers and represent a diverse population more representative of the patients being served. nurses who advance from other healthcare positions are generally better prepared to meet the demands of the bedside, are more aware of the work environment and ready to meet its unique challenges.

senator durbin has continually offered legislation to address the nationwide nursing shortage. most recently, he led a bi-partisan effort to adopt a six-year pilot program aimed at encouraging nurses leaving the military to become nurse educators. the troops to nurse teachers program was included in the senate 2008 department of defense authorization bill.

along with congresswoman nita lowey (d-ny), durbin introduced the nurse education, expansion, and development (need) on january 31, 2007 to address one of the major causes – an insufficient number of nurse educators – by providing grants to colleges to improve their ability to educate nursing students.

ppease edit thread to include only a couple of sentences and the link to the article. this has been posted someplace else, so is under the us copyright law.

[suzanne4, RN]

Bills are introduced all of the time, and most do not get passed. There is no way that a foreign nurse can enter the US without going thru the entire immigration process to begin with, that is just not going to happen. If anything, the requirements are going to get stricter, not lighter.

Patient safety demands that. Anyone must go thru immigration procedures to get a visa that will permit them to work in the US, and all nurses require the Visa Screen Certificate as well. Suspect that you are going to start to see that required in the near future before any petition will be able to be submitted, not just required for the interview with the US Embassy.

Notice that there is nothing in that bill that even mentions foreign nurses. That is not in that bill at all, so not sure where you are coming up with the idea of not having to go thru the immigration procedure.

[RNGrad2006]

Bills are introduced all of the time, and most do not get passed. There is no way that a foreign nurse can enter the US without going thru the entire immigration process to begin with, that is just not going to happen. If anything, the requirements are going to get stricter, not lighter.

Patient safety demands that. Anyone must go thru immigration procedures to get a visa that will permit them to work in the US, and all nurses require the Visa Screen Certificate as well. Suspect that you are going to start to see that required in the near future before any petition will be able to be submitted, not just required for the interview with the US Embassy.

Notice that there is nothing in that bill that even mentions foreign nurses. That is not in that bill at all, so not sure where you are coming up with the idea of not having to go thru the immigration procedure.

My understanding from the original posters question is their fear of the end to immigration, not that immigration is no longer required. I hope that doesn't happen completely since I just recently applied myself under AOS but it seems the focus from Durbin is to educate US citizens to become nurses instead of continuing to rely on foreingers to fill the nursing shortage. Although that is not exactly stated by Durbin. Many do apply to nursing school but my experience has been just because pre-requisites are met for entry that does not mean all will graduate. Nursing school is grueling partly because not everyone is cut out for nursing and the demands that you must face. But those already in the healthcare workforce may be the exact ones that will succeed, so it may be a good approach. I work with some fabulous CNA's that would make great nurses but many do not pursue it due to their inability to manage work, tuition, and studying at the same time.

[suzanne4, RN]

Sorry that I misunderstood their post when I first read it.

To clear up a few things, there has always been a limit as to how many foreign nurses or anyone can get a visa to live and work in the US with the green card. It is never been automatic, and even more so now with even graduating from a US school if nursing; it is no longer automatic that the nurse will be able to remain in the US with the green card. From some countries especially, there are many more applicants than there are visas available per year, so the odds of getting the green card diminish from there.

If the nurse is from a country that is not flooding the USCIS with applications/petitions for the green card; then they have a better chance to get a green card. Remember that the US goes by country of birth, not where the nurse is currently a citizen of, or where they currently reside.

There are people in the US that were born and raised here that are being laid off from jobs in certain industries, and the US government as well as the state governments want them to get retrained in other careers. You see this with programs that Michigan has set up, with lay-offs in the car industry, they are not putting MI residents thru programs so that they can find jobs, and some will be in nursing. They are bringing over a large number of nurses from Canada for MI, and they want to be able to give their residents jobs that are out of work.

Immigration has always had lulls in it as far as visas have gone. Back when H1-B visas were what everyone went thru initially, I remember a time when there was about five year period when you did not see any new visas being issued, only those that were here already were getting theirs renewed.

We still have the TN Visa in place for those from Canada and Mexico; those from Mexico will have a much longer wait to get a green card because of the number of applicants from that country. And it is faster for the RN from Canada to get the TN Visa, than it is from Mexico. They are stricter with those visas down there.

[suzanne4, RN]

There will always be foreign nurses coming to the US, but do not expect an unlimited number to come, that is never going to happen.

Nor is it happening in other countries either, look at the UK, as well as Canada. And the rest of the European Union just for a few.