Foreign Nurse Recruitment – Be Cautious
May 21st, 2008 by pdaurizioWhenever I read articles about foreign nurse recruitment, my cautious side emerges. Years ago, mainly in the late 1970’s and into the early 1990’s when the Nurse Relief Act was in place, this was a very viable alternative to the staffing crisis many hospitals were facing.
Bringing nurses on three-year employer sponsored visas was not a terribly cumbersome process and, if dealing with a reputable company, was also not a terribly expensive process. All of that changed when the NRA expired and to this day has not been renewed, leaving the only other option to bring nurses here on H-1 Visas. This of course does not affect Canadian nurses, who are governed by NAFTA, and can still enter the U.S. under this agreement.
More than two years ago, Retrogression was put into place and, simply put, all the visas that had been available for nurses to come here and work were used and no additional ones were legislated. This resulted in all of those nurses waiting to come being put on existing lists from their countries of origin. Depending on the country, it could take several years or more for them to get a visa.
There are hundreds if not thousands of nurses caught in this immigration limbo just waiting overseas to come here. The sad thing is many of them have made enormous sacrifices to take the required exams and in many cases, to pay the fees to become eligible to work in the States. This process is lengthy, expensive and difficult, but worse yet, all of the exams they must take with the exception of the NCLEX expire in TWO YEARS and must be retaken for immigration to grant new credentials to renew their Visa Screen. For many of these nurses, having to retake the exams and repay the fees will be prohibitively expensive and they will be unable to do this.
On this side of the ocean, many hospitals are ‘out’ the deposits they have paid companies for these nurses who at this point in time may never get here.
Retrogression has left many nurses unable to immigrate after going through exhaustive and expensive processes to get their credentials and examinations taken care of. In addition, hospitals are feeling very frustrated and financially at a loss and many companies who provided this service are out of business.
Be very cautious when looking at foreign recruitment today, because the visa regulations prelude nearly all RNs, with very few exceptions, from coming to the U.S. in any realistic time frame due to the waiting lists.
I personally know several nurses who had completed everything, including NCLEX, and because of the Retrogression are literally stuck in their home countries, and have been for over two years now, with no idea of when they may be granted a visa.