Through the back door: nurse migration to the UK from Malawi and Nepal, a policy critique

Abstract

The UK National Health Service has a long history of recruiting overseas nurses to meet nursing shortages in the UK. However, recruitment patterns regularly fluctuate in response to political and economic changes. Typically, the UK government gives little consideration of how these unstable recruitment practices affect overseas nurses. In this article, we present findings from two independent research studies from Malawi and Nepal, which aimed to examine how overseas nurses encountered and overcame the challenges linked to recent recruitment and migration restrictions. We show how current UK immigration policy has had a negative impact on overseas nurses' lives. It has led them to explore alternative entry routes into the UK, affecting both the quality of their working lives and their future decisions about whether to stay or return to their home country. We conclude that the shifting forces of nursing workforce demand and supply, leading to abrupt policy changes, have significant implications on overseas nurses' lives, and can leave nurses 'trapped' in the UK. We make recommendations for UK policy-makers to work with key stakeholders in nurse-sending countries to minimize the negative consequences of unstable nurse recruitment, and we highlight the benefits of promoting circular migration.

A deskilling and challenging journey: the lived experience of Indonesian nurse returnees

“…Cross‐country mobility of nurses has been evolving along with the demand of health care (World Health Organization ). The movement of nurses has become a global issue with profound impact on countries involved (Adhikari & Grigulis ). Notwithstanding the adoption of the World Health Organization (WHO) global code on the international recruitment of health personnel, this non‐binding code has been less successful in preventing the move of health professionals from developing to developed countries (Tankwanchi et al.…”

Perspectives of developing nursing education in Nepal

“…The majority of competent and experienced nurses desire to employ in developed countries, such as the UK, North America, Australia and New Zealand. [15][16][17][18][19] There is no efficient managing policy to maintain a nursing workforce, predominantly in rural Nepal. Nursing education, after all, should not be a business profitable to few private sector people and a net loss to the nation, students and their parents.…”

“…36 The data depicts 4155 nurses migrated abroad till 2013. 15,18,19 The USA, the UK, Australia and Canada are top four countries that receive trained nurses from Nepal. 37,40 As a result, Nepal is losing skillful manpower of the country with serious scarcity of trained, experienced and skillful manpower which outspokenly goes in front to financially viable failure of the country.…”

Work experiences of internationally trained pharmacists in Great Britain

“…In the last decade, the number of internationally trained doctors (ITDs), nurses and pharmacists in Great Britain's (GB) health care workforce has grown [1–9]. For example, the proportion of internationally trained pharmacists (ITPs) on the Register of Pharmacists has risen from 10.1% in 2004 to 12.1% in 2010 [10,11].…”

“…In the last decade, the number of internationally trained doctors (ITDs), nurses and pharmacists in Great Britain's (GB) health care workforce has grown. [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9] For example, the proportion of internationally trained pharmacists (ITPs) on the Register of Pharmacists has risen from 10.1% in 2004 to 12.1% in 2010. [10,11] This has resulted in a great deal of research on ITDs and internationally trained nurses (ITNs); however, very little is known about ITPs in GB.…”