United Kingdom Nurses

Silverdragon102, BSN · Jul 17, 2011

You will need to meet NMC requirements and is ADN then you will not meet requirements. Then will be a case of looking for employer which involves job is on the UK shortage Occupation list. As someone from outside the EU you may have problems finding employer

Marquel MSN RN CCRN · Jul 18, 2011

I have my BSN degree and I work on the Progressive Care unit currently.

babyNP., APRN · Jul 19, 2011

It's super hard to get a job in the UK right now as a nurse unless you are on the shortage specialty list, which I believe currently includes OR or NICU experience. The NHS is suffering from budget cuts and have been letting nurses go, so there are plenty of nurses in the UK who are looking for work; i.e. why would they hire you if they can hire from within? Same idea with why there is such a large retrogression of visas for foreign nurses trying to get into the U.S. They (and we) have to serve our own first. Plus it's $$$ for the company to sponsor the applicant.

edit: Here's the most recent link from the UKBA for shortage occupations that I was able to find: http://www.ukba.homeoffice.gov.uk/sitecontent/documents/workingintheuk/shortageoccupationlist.pdf

Looks like pharmacists in any capacity are on it.

Even if you have the OR or NICU experience, the employer has to prove that there is no one in the UK or the European Union that can do the job, so seriously doubt that you'll be able to secure on over there. NPs may be a different story, but I'm not up to snuff on that one.

On the other hand, if you have UK citizenship or citizenship with an EU country, you would be qualified to get a job, assuming you can get the NMC registration, which seems to be hit-and-miss for American nurses.

To top it off, keep in mind that RNs in the UK generally don't get paid as well as they do in the U.S., so it might be harder for you to maintain a similar standard of living. For example, a RN starts out at 21,176 pounds in band 5 (http://www.nhscareers.nhs.uk/details/Default.aspx?Id=4). This is about $35,000 in USD even though cost-of-living is the same or higher (in general). The benefits are that health care is paid for and you get a lot more vacation time than in the U.S. Plus living in a foreign country I suppose :)

Here's the NMC registration page for folks trained outside the UK/EEA:

http://www.nmc-uk.org/Registration/Joining-the-register/Trained-outside-the-EU--EEA/

If you do start down the journey, I hope you'll post your experiences for those that may be reading this! Your information would be invaluable :) Good luck!