Repatriating back to the states after 14 years

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Specializes in Home Care, Primary care NP, QI, Nsg Adm.

Greetings Colleagues,

I'd appreciate some advice for the following; I have been working as a DON in a Saudi mental health and addiction facility for the past 13 years and am planning to repat after one more contract (1 year). I am an adult NP, certified and currently about mid-way through a masters in health adm. I have 30 years experience in the health field. It will take a year or so to arrange for a return with my family, cats, etc.

Now, I'm not sure the direction to take. I have accomplished a lot in a working environment far different than in the states. I am the sole westerner and most of my nurses are considered technical which by ICN definition is an LPN but actually, not trained nearly as well as LPN's in the States. I have a few RN's from the Philippines. I am not a psych nurse and initially the hospital was for addiction only. I have a good background in addiction but not sure if i want to stay with it.

They opened psych in 2000 so by default I became a nursing administrator of a psychiatry division as well. I have 260 nurses covering 280 beds. I have also done several consultancy projects for the Ministry of Health for emergency services and start up of the specialty hospital in our area that included overseas recruitment.

I actually left main stream nursing in 1981 to enter NP school. Practiced until 1995 when I came Saudi and have not practiced since but still certified. I concentrate on teaching physical assessment and general nursing process which is sorely lacking with my staff. Frankly, I don't want to work in mental health when I return and would like to get back to general medicine. My interest is now in administration and leadership with a foot iin the clinical area.

I am not sure how to approach job hunting and selection. i thought about an RN refresher on return to get up to speed on new technologies. Psych is low tech especially in Saudi and I need a serious review of medicine if i am to go back to practice although I think adm is more my taste but w/o general hospital management experience not sure where I could start.

If anybody has been in this position or has any thoughts on this i would really appreciate your input.

Thanks

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