Specializes in Specializes in L/D, newborn, GYN, LTC, Dialysis.
Well according to dplear, I may be "ignorant" but...
i just don't think the answer to our crisis is importing nurses from countries less fortunate than ours. people are the world's most valuable resource. WHY DOES THE USA have to take OTHERS' resources, and in the process, making working conditions and pay worse here?
Well according to dplear, I may be "ignorant" but...
i just don't think the answer to our crisis is importing nurses from countries less fortunate than ours. people are the world's most valuable resource. WHY DOES THE USA have to take OTHERS' resources, and in the process, making working conditions and pay worse here?
answer: $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
The answer is simple: Because we can! We do whatever we want, because we can do it.
It is a lot less "bothersome" to import nurses who are jumping for joy to be here, and who won't rock the boat, no matter how bad working conditions are. That's the kind of nurse they want.
this is just a great paragraph that i found in one of the studies i'm reading, about global movement of nurses, and the ethics of aggressive recruitment from developing nations. i think it just about sums it up:
"however, it is clear that the flow of nurses, partly as a result of active recruitment by industrialized countries, is a symptom of deep seated problems in these countries that have failed to plan for, and retain, sufficient nurses from their own sources. international recruitment of nurses is a symptom of global shortages of nurses, but the underlying problems can only be solved by local-level and country-level improvements in the status of nursing and in the planning and management of the nursing workforce.
Deb, I never called you ignorant...i said the ignorance of NurseHardee never fails to amaze me. Roxanne, you can quote all the articles you want but until you have seen the issue first hand like I have. And yes I do travel back to the Philippines quite often, after all I do have property and businesses there. I visit the local hospitals and I do not see the Brain Drain that you speak of. In fact most of thier hospitals are better staffed than ours. The schools there for the most part are US Accreditied. They have based thier education model after the US model. They are not "factories" as it has been put forward here. I would dare say that most US nurses would not survive in their schools...
Deb, I never called you ignorant...i said the ignorance of NurseHardee never fails to amaze me. Roxanne, you can quote all the articles you want but until you have seen the issue first hand like I have. And yes I do travel back to the Philippines quite often, after all I do have property and businesses there. I visit the local hospitals and I do not see the Brain Drain that you speak of. In fact most of thier hospitals are better staffed than ours. The schools there for the most part are US Accreditied. They have based thier education model after the US model. They are not "factories" as it has been put forward here. I would dare say that most US nurses would not survive in their schools...
Dave
Well Dplear, I posted those articles up so readers on the board could see that some people consider the international migration of Filipino nurses to be a problem, even if you don't. As I have already stated, I can't argue about your personal experience. But I find it a little odd that they would hold an entire conference on the subject of losing their nurses if it wasn't a problem. I mean, if all was nice and rosy as you portray it to be, then why would anyone care?
There have been a number of articles written on this subject, and I also have several recent studies focusing on nurse migration. And they all say the same thing about the Phillippines--they are losing their experienced nurses and are beginning to suffer a brain drain. I find it a little hard to believe that everyone is simply making this up, and fabricating numbers. I have also spoken to people in the Health Ministry, the nursings associations, etc., and they also are very concerned about the rapidly increasing migration of their nurses. I suppose that they are fabricating it as well.
I find it a little hard to believe that their staffing is better than ours. Nurses report that they go abroad not only for pay, but for better working conditions. I don't know what hospitals you visited, but nurses often have 30 or more patients--yes, a 1:30 ratio. Okay, I know, those numbers were fabricated as well.
Finally, my comments on the schools. I was not referring to the accredited schools which are very rigorous and produce high quality nurses. But in answer to the increased need, many schools are springing up to increase the output of nurses. Many of these schools do not meet the Phillippine accreditation standards, and there is a lower passage rate of the Philippine boards. That was what my comment about "factories" was. That in the rush to put out more nurses, they are hurriedly opening lower quality schools. Nursing leaders are concerned about this, as there is an acute shortage of teachers in the Phillippines as well. Their experienced nurses are leaving, so there is no one left to teach.
I'm not going to argue further with you about this. From numerous reliable sources, the Philippines is experiencing a critical shortage of experienced nurses, which may have lasting negative effects on its healthcare system. And that is the information that I am going to use for the project I am working on.
I would be happy to hear any specific numbers that you have, dplear, to support your statements. What are the nurse/patient ratios? How many nurses are there in the Philippines, and how many nurses per person? How many nurses are leaving as opposed to the number graduating each year? How many can't find jobs in the Philippines, as you mentioned in another post? Unless you can support your statements with some hard facts and statistics, I'm afraid that I will have to use all of that "fabricated" information that I've been given.
Specializes in Specializes in L/D, newborn, GYN, LTC, Dialysis.
I know you did not call me ignorant Dave.
but by virtue of totally agreeing with nursehardee in this case, I guess in your book, I would be...by association.
I just think we all have different perspectives here. I think we are WRONG to import nurses from needy countries like the PI and India. For many reasons already stated here more articulately than I have made my points.
I am a Filipino nurse and presently working here in our country. I am very touched by all your words of praises to these Filipino nurses already working there. I can't help but to be teary-eyed by all your affirmations. I too would like to work there, of course to help my family here and to meet people like you.
The answer to the original question is simple economics. They make more money here and YES they do send it back home.
I remember at one time that some governments taxed you if you lived out of the orginal country. Don't know if the Phillipines does that as well. The USA does.
I believe this is the most interesting topic I ever encountered at this site. And I cite Roxanne for her well researched articles and Dave and other for theirs approval on Filipino nurses. Yes, I have read those articles that Roxanne posted here and its true but anybody can disagree it even us, Filipinos.
I am a nurse myself but the last time I gave medications to patients was 10 years ago. You see, When I graduated in 1991, the USA has started closing its doors to Filipino nurses and the Middle East taking advantage of the situation started offering low salaries to nurses that caused the drop of nursing students here.
In earning my BSN, I spent four years in college which included three years in the hospital as a student nurse. You can just imagine the preparation we Filipinos are doing to just earn the degree. After graduation, I passed the Nursing Board exams on that same year. There were 30,000 nurses who took the exam that year and only 20,000 made it. I voluntered( without pay ) in a military hospital for six months to gain experience needed to get a job. Yes, we do volunter just to get the necessary experience needed for jobs locally and abroad. I took and passed my CGFNS in 1992 but wasn't able to get to the States. I worked again as a volunter nurse in a local hospital but was not hired because there were no hiring. No nurses are going abroad and the turnover has settled to ZERO. So, I decided to work as a private duty nurse, which were very lucrative at that time, handling patients that needed special attention on an on-call basis until 1994. The job was not permanent with no benefits. With no real opportunities to work as a nurse, I applied for a job in the pharmacuetical market as a medical sales representative. That time , pharmaceutical companies started hiring nurses because they have medical backgrounds, can relate well to medical products and are easy to train than other college graduates.
At present, all the hospitals here in my city are run by young nurses. Only few old nurses are left behind. Most of them in the management positions. Even my teachers in college have already left for London and the States. They were replaced by young nurses some of whom were my classmates. Surely there is braindrain here but not of astronomical proportion. Our books in nursing are all American. When we do demonstrations in class on nursing procedures, we used English as the medium and not our national language which is Tagalog. Our Tagalog doesn't have the equivalent for words like prn, stat, od, bid and other medical terms. If you asked why Filipinos talk Tagalog in the workplace specially in US hospitals is because the Philippines has 83 languages and Tagalog is the only local language which most of us understand. I speak Chavacano which is a mixture of Spanish and local dialect, aside from that I also speak Bisayan the language of my mother. When I speak to my boss in the office I use Tagalog. When I do product presentations to doctors or sales report to my bosses, I speak to them in English.
The Only Big issue here in the Philippines is economy. If the Philippines is like the USA surely there will be no more migration of nurses. As long our economy is not improving you can expect more of us going there. And as long as your government will not "improved" your nurses' salaries, shortages of nurses will always be the problem. And some of us don't quite understand why American nurses are complaining about salaries when in fact on a 20dollar an hour a Filipino nurse can have a decent home, a car and some savings. My best friend started on a 12dollar an hour 8 years ago in Michigan and now on a on 22dollar an hour. Maybe it has to do with our different backgrounds. Our culture also plays emphasize on taking take of our elders that's why in the PHilippines there are no such thing as nursing homes. With the aging population in the USA increasing, America needs more of us whether we are Americans, Filipinos or Indian nurses because that is our job, our profession and we dedicate our lives to helping those who need help, care and compassion.
I hope this will help all of you to understand us, Filipino nurses.
I With the aging population in the USA increasing, America needs more of us whether we are Americans, Filipinos or Indian nurses because that is our job, our profession and we dedicate our lives to helping those who need help, care and compassion.
I hope this will help all of you to understand us, Filipino nurses.
The problem is not Filipino nurses, or Indian nurses, or Chinese nurses, or whoever. The problem is that by importing foreign nurses to fill our staffing holes--most of which are made by American nurses leaving the profession--employees have no incentive to correct workplace problems. For a Filipino nurse, coming to the US, maybe it seems that Americans are complaining over nothing. You think that $20/hour is good money. Well, we don't. Nurses spend a great deal of money on education, and it is hard and intense work. You are also responsible for keeping people alive. Other industries pay people more money, for jobs that are much easier, and so on. Nursing salaries have remained flat, and often stay relatively flat for a nurse's career, unless she moves into management, or goes on to get an advanced degree.
We have over half a million licensed nurses who no longer work in nursing. Our shortage is artificial. The shortage is of tolerable places to work. And if American employers think that they can get cheap labor from overseas, they will do so.
Yes, cheap labor. Many foreign nurses are paid at the bottom end of the pay scale. It is quite legal, as long as it falls within the hospital's pay scale. Foreign nurses are often not given full credit for their years of employment. And they are initially bound by a 3 year contract, so employers can freely load them up with poor work schedules, unsafe patient loads, mandatory overtime, and other abuses, and they are not likely to complain.
Flooding our market with foreign labor will bring down salaries and worsen workplace situations. Again, this is nothing personal against foreign nurses coming over, and certainly, foreign nurses are welcome. However, widescale recruitment, which is going on now, is not beneficial. Immigration lawyers and others are trying to get our immigration system made wide open to foreign nurses. I see this as a complete disaster.
This is from the International Council of Nurses, about nations recruiting overseas:
"The ICN also condemns the practice of recruiting of nurses to countries where governments and other relevant authorities have failed to address deficiencies known to cause nurses to leave the profession and which discourages them from returning."
About half the local elected leadership including one of two on the Board of Directors and the President of the Los Angeles region were born in the Phillipines.
I think that so many of the Filipinas go into nsg because there are no other careers open for women there. I bet if other options were available they quit going to nsg school in droves.
SmilingBluEyes
20,964 Posts
Well according to dplear, I may be "ignorant" but...
i just don't think the answer to our crisis is importing nurses from countries less fortunate than ours. people are the world's most valuable resource. WHY DOES THE USA have to take OTHERS' resources, and in the process, making working conditions and pay worse here?
answer: $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$