Wanting to Work in the UK

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Hello all,

I have seen all internet address for starting off the long paper work especially the NMC. Are there any easier ways to go about this? I am very confused as to how to go about starting. I am a Canadian trained Rn and I am presently working inthe US.

Would you recommend any companies to work with or any help is greatly appreciated. Thanks and hope this

Specializes in RN, BSN, CHDN.
I'd be careful about generalising about such a large country. Are there hospitals where nurses just carry out orders without any independent thought? Sure. Not where I've worked though. It doesn't describe my experience in several hospitals in California and Washington.

Are you asking me to be careful?

I accept I am generalising but doesnt everybody seem to generalise. I have supporting evidence from several states, I actually know girls who have spoken their mind and have been fired. I am trying to make a statement that it can happen in the US but it never happens in Uk hospitals. I am obviously aware that in all the hospitals in this big country do not have the same working practices.

Plus I had inserted a link which I hoped would support my statement

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Specializes in RN, BSN, CHDN.

I have now highlighted the link so it can be seen more easily

plus here is the direct link to the article mentioned in the thread

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-to-work_law

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I have worked in the US and UK. I never saw US nurses "just following orders" but in the UK I have seen nurses carry out orders that they knew were dodgy because "it's the doctors decision, so that's what I'll do". In all honesty, I have seen good and bad nurses on both sides of the atlantic. There is no difference.

It's a bad idea to generalize, because things are so different state by state in America. I saw a nurse get fired from my trust in the UK for making a stand about something. I think they are quicker to fire in the US though.

I work on an acute medical ward in England. We are now done to 1 staff nurse and 1 HCA for 28 people on a day shift. If we are very lucky we will have two. Our ward clerk left, and the trust won't replace her so we never have a ward clerk. They will not bring in agency, no matter how short we are, and they refuse to pay people who do any overtime. They tell people who work over hours to take "Time owing".

I do like the vacation time in the UK and my wonderful colleagues but I am appalled at the way some of these wards are being allowed to run staffing wise. I can't handle the one RN to 28 acute (and mostly dependent) medical patients. I want to stay in the UK, but this is burning me out big time. There is no chance of getting another job at my trust due to the recruitment freeze. It is almost like they want to see the RN's leave. I see one fantastic British nurse after another leave, and the trust does nothing to try and retain them. It's more like "don't let the door hit your orifice on the way out".

My British hubby wants to stick around in the UK for awhile longer. I am thinking about retraining as a legal secretary or something.

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Specializes in RN, BSN, CHDN.

I apologise for being generalised this has obviously upset some posters, I stand corrected.

I am surprised that you saw somebody fired for taking a stand in the UK, I dont think in my 17 year career I ever saw anybody fired for anything, not even when they made a humungous errors. You almost have to commit murder and then it is still difficult lol. God knows what your collegue did but it must have been serious to warrent being fired.

What I can say with obsolute conviction is I have never ever carried out an order which was obviously 'dodgy' just because the Dr ordered it. I have however witnessed it here. I have to say where I worked admittedly for a brief period of time, a lot of the nurses were very new, the turn over was quick so there wasn't lots of experience to draw on.

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You didn't upset me at all Madwife. I agree with a lot of what you said. The nurse who got fired at my trust took a political stand so to speak and made our chief nurse and assorted other punks look like the stupid jerks that they are. They were basically wrong about something and she exposed it in a brave way. It had nothing to do with patient care. She was our union rep BTW.

I know it is unusual in the UK to have this kind of thing happen, but we currently have what appears to be psychopaths running our trust. I could tell you some stories about the stuff they are threatening to sack people on the spot over. I don't think that they would have a legal leg to stand on with most of it anyway.

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Specializes in ER.

I am going to throw this question out.. It seems that there is a shortage of nursing in the UK, but there is no money to pay for more nurses right? With this, nurses are more apt to look to work oversea's but there is a fear of getting fired? I have worked in Canada, and in Washingtion and California. I haven't seen any nurses get fired but from what I have seen the health care systems are different. Canada and I am sure the UK see healthcare as a service, where US it is a buisness, so there is the ease of moving from hospital to hospital when the offer is better.

What I am wanting to know is, are many nurses getting burnt out in the UK? and is any influence or help from the Government to ease this to help preserve the healthcare?

Would it be even worth trying to get registered and try to get employment over there?

Just some food for thought...

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Specializes in RN, BSN, CHDN.

I think burn out is def on the increase, especailly with the new pressures of redundances plus high patient ratio and low nurse ratio.

Where I used to work the ratio for 10 pts was 2 RN's and 3-4 HCSW, depending on the day of the week. On the afternoon shift it was 2 RN's/2HCSW. By the time I left it was 2RN's and 1-2 HCSW. Pm shift 2 RN's-1hcsw. So we were well staffed compared to most-but it was a very heavy ward all pts were immobile and had severe neuro imparement. You needed at least 2 nurses per pt for manual handling and hoisting. Pt's and relatives very demanding, turn over was slow anything from 3-6 months. Whilst that is lovely, you get to know your pts, it can be stressful when you get a patient and his/her family being very demanding.

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I know we are burned out where I work. When I first started on a 30 bedded ward for acute medical patients we had 4 RN's and 3 HCA's. Now we are down to 2 RN's and 1 HCA for a day shift. If one RN phones in sick, the other RN must take the ward alone. They will not replace her with agency or allow anyone to work overtime etc etc.

Most of our patients are highly dependent, confused, immobile we have IV insulins infusing and bloods on multiple people. It's nuts.

The thing that makes me RAGE is that the relatives and patients are constantly complaining that the nurses are crap and granny is getting neglected because the nurses just "don't care".

What kind of care do they think granny is going to get when her nurse has

25+ other acutely ill medical patients she is legally responsible for? The public sits on their asses and allows the hospitals to pull this kind of crap, then slags off the nursing staff who work a 12 hour day without a break trying to make it all work.

I was discharging a patient a few weeks ago and in the middle of going through her discharge orders with her, another patient went into cardiac arrest. I was the only nurse on the ward, I left the discharge and went running to the patient who arrested, initiated CPR etc etc. As the cardiac arrest finished up, another patient yanked out her central line so I had to go straight to that. There was no other staff to sort that discharge, and I had my priorities.

The patient who was being discharged and her partner gave me HELL for leaving her in the middle of sorting out her discharge and taking so long to get back to her. I got a nice lecture about how I screwed up their day and their plans and caused them to get parking fines because it took me so long to get back to sorting out her discharge.

I did file an incident report at the beginning of the shift because I knew it would be bad for one nurse to have that many patients with that kind of acuity. I did ask that I get another RN for that shift and they told me no way.

I've had enough anyway. Time to apply over at Tescos.

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Specializes in RN, BSN, CHDN.

God what awful shift but more common than rare these days. Before I left the shifts were horrendous with RN's often working alone because there was no money for agency. When it was me I felt better than when it was a junior nurse, the other sister and I would just come in to work to help out the junior staff on our days off rather than leave them. I know since I have gone, the other sister has had time off with stress and that was just unheard of. They didnt replace me they just thought thank god she's gone, we wont recruit to her job it cost too much money. So my friend and collegue now does my job as well.

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Are you asking me to be careful?

I accept I am generalising but doesnt everybody seem to generalise. I have supporting evidence from several states, I actually know girls who have spoken their mind and have been fired. I am trying to make a statement that it can happen in the US but it never happens in Uk hospitals. I am obviously aware that in all the hospitals in this big country do not have the same working practices.

Plus I had inserted a link which I hoped would support my statement

I just mean saying something like "that doesn't happen here" is a bit extreme if you're refering to the US in general because that will no doubt be the case in some places and not in others. If it's your unit, I can see it. I've worked mostly union jobs since graduating and haven't seen people fired willy nilly.

Personally, I've never carried out any dodgy orders either. I'd been out of nursing school about 6 months when I refused my first order. I wasn't fired for it and even if I was it would have been the right thing to do:) Nursing schools in the US and Canada often stress the issue of liability and no one wants to lose their lisence.

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Specializes in RN, BSN, CHDN.
I just mean saying something like "that doesn't happen here" is a bit extreme if you're refering to the US in general because that will no doubt be the case in some places and not in others. If it's your unit, I can see it. I've worked mostly union jobs since graduating and haven't seen people fired willy nilly.

Personally, I've never carried out any dodgy orders either. I'd been out of nursing school about 6 months when I refused my first order. I wasn't fired for it and even if I was it would have been the right thing to do:) Nursing schools in the US and Canada often stress the issue of liability and no one wants to lose their lisence.

OK I am being dramatic but it feels good to be getting back to normal after 4 months of hell :lol2:.

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Specializes in ER.

Okay, from what everyone here is saying, do you think it would be a good idea for international nurses to try to get employment in the UK?

:confused:

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