Nursing in Ottawa

Mods:

can you move this to the Canadian Forum. He'll get realistic answers there.

The rational side of my brain says sure. The other side say's it's Ottawa, home of the civil servants who love to make everything bi-lingual.

Hey everybody, and thanks for moving my tread to the correct place, still trying to get used to this website. This situation is quite unique. My partner is taking on a job opportunity that will in the end (if he likes it) guarantee a job basically for life with the type of law he does, without having to go back to school. He's accepted the job in Montreal downtown. He will rent for a year, while I staty behind and visit to complete my degree. If within the year things are still good, then the question comes what now? (I know this sounds like a Dear Abby). We discussed my career, which is important to me; me learning a new language is likely, but very unlikely as it is a lot of work, so my only other option is to nurse from Ottawa.

We considered meeting halfway and purchasing a place 45 mins outside of montreal closer to Ottawa, and hoping that Cornwall would be a good opportunity, but again is this very realistic? I mean if I was fulltime I would either have to pray to get 2 days 2 nights 5 off as I have here in Toronto, or switch to Part time and work 2-3 times per week. I dunno just a bit frustrated.

Robert

I have no advice really, just want to say you're in a tough situation and I wish you the best at figuring it out. Where there's a will there's a way, right?

Hi Robert

I can't really speak to Cornwall but I live in Ottawa. There are lots of opportunities for English nurses here but bilingualism is definitely an asset. The Montfort is primarily a French hospital. The Ottawa Hospital (the largest hospital with something like 3800 nurses) is bilingual and rarely hires anglophones. CHEO (the children's hospital) provides bilingual services but not all their staff is bilingual, though I understand most postings are for bilingual staff. The Queensway Carleton (a smaller community hospital) is primarily English. Public health is bilingual. I work in Mental Health at the Royal. We are all psych. Our working language is English but we have some designated bilingual programs where 50% of the staff must be bilingual. That said, the other 50% are English-speaking. Most of our outpatient and community positions are bilingual.

As far as I know, there is language training offered at all the local hospitals if you do decide to pursue that.

Ottawa is generally more francophone in the east end and more anglophone as you go west and south. In terms of the commute, lots of people live outside the city and commute 45 min to an hour. If you are to the east of the city (between Montreal and Ottawa) be aware that if you work in the west end (where more of the English hospitals are) you will need to add the time to drive across the city to get to work. Could add another 30 - 45 minutes to the commute depending on traffic and time of day.

Good luck!

Thanks for all your responses. This is a tricky situation. I took French in school as a kid, and in high school but because I never thought I would need it I didn't pursue to take it any longer, until now. I am still in the preparation phase of this move. I will continue my studies as an RN and work as an RPN - it's a good year ahead of me. I can see myself learning the basic's of the language, but to be completely fluent is a long shot, that would most likely occur when I am working with that community. I don't see myself working taking the extra initiative to be licensed in Montreal (Quebec) the process is horrifying; I understand it, but I can't see myself doing it, which leads me to step 2, which is Ottawa. Luckily being part of a University I was actually speaking to my director of the nursing program today and I 'toyed' with the idea of doing my pre-grad in Cornwall because my school is affiliated with it. That way I can gain some experience as an RN working in a bilingual hospital while studying french (Rosetta Stone here I come), to then hopefully working towards getting my foot in the door, as it is so close to the border of Montreal, and combine that with where we would potentially locate our home (outside of Montreal) it seems that I DO have A LOT of work a head of me, but what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.

My last option would be to find a job in English speaking hospitals, but that would require a lot of dedication, commitment and travelling.

I hear that the Civic hires english speaking nurses. Im wondering if they would consider me, if they knew I was taking classes and working towards learning more French, because let's just face it, I'll learn more working with the community than I would in a classroom and at home.

Also, as you may or may not know, we work with various cultures around the world where a lot of people that come to this country seeking health care have no clue how to form an english sentence, we turn to our colleagues sometimes as interpreters, so I am just wondering if this would be the same type of scenario in a bilingual care centre.

Robert

Doing the pre-grad in Cornwall is a good idea. As far as improving your French, consider taking classes while you are still in the GTA, the Glendon campus of York university offers french courses throughout the year, they also offer intensive and immersion courses in the summer, if Glendon does not interest you, consider Alliance franciose.

Hi Robert

You could definitely apply at the Civic but it is a campus of the Ottawa Hospital and I believe most of their postings would be for bilingual nurses. The Civic Campus is in the west end so most of the patients are English vs the General Campus where there are a higher percentage of Francophones. The thing about Ottawa is that, being Ottawa, there is a push for bilingual services. The fact is that something like less than 2% of people in this area are unilingual Francophones. We see a lot more unilingual patients who speak Russian, Somalian or Chinese. :-)

Hi Robert

You could definitely apply at the Civic but it is a campus of the Ottawa Hospital and I believe most of their postings would be for bilingual nurses. The Civic Campus is in the west end so most of the patients are English vs the General Campus where there are a higher percentage of Francophones. The thing about Ottawa is that, being Ottawa, there is a push for bilingual services. The fact is that something like less than 2% of people in this area are unilingual Francophones. We see a lot more unilingual patients who speak Russian, Somalian or Chinese. :-)

You gotta love our government for this one. In my area being bi-lingual means English/Chinese, English/Ukranian, or English/Somali.

Back in the 60s & 70s my father was in the military. He would always check off the "Bilingual" box on forms because he was fluent in German and English. The powers-that-be were NOT amused!

Hey everyone! Really appreciate the responses! So far, I have a tutor! Im going to be working with him once a week, pick up a workbook and learn as much as I can! I have to say that my agenda is quite full now, but as nurses we become so good at multi tasking! So far nights at work are turning into me glancing onto my iphone and downloading apps that test your french!

What's good is that the BASIC that I do know are coming back, but it is definatly going to take SOME TIME! Going for a trip to Montreal in a couple weeks, gonna test my skills there hahahhahah...I''m pretty sure I will get a couple 'cut-eyes', but who the heck cares!

R