‘There were moments I questioned my passion for the job’: the overseas nurses helping to keep the NHS running
Even before the pandemic struck, there was a shortage of nurses in the UK. In January 2020, a survey by the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) found that almost three-quarters of nurses said the staffing level on their last shift was not sufficient to meet the needs of patients safely and effectively. Yet this month NHS England predicted that the government will not meet its manifesto pledge to boost the NHS’s nursing workforce by 50,000 by March 2024. The key reason? NHS workers are quitting in droves, citing burnout, fatigue and pay as factors.
Filling these gaps are nurses from overseas. Recently released figures for 2021 and 2022 from the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) show that record numbers of nurses trained overseas are coming to work in the UK – almost half of new registrations. We spoke to four of them about their experience working in the UK.
I landed in the UK from the Philippines for the first time on a freezing January day in 2016. I didn’t know anyone in the UK, other than some distant relatives in Northampton and Birmingham, and I had left my husband at home.
Even though I had a nursing degree, I had to pass a number of tests in order to work here, which cost me about £600. After that, the trust sent me sponsorship documents and a one-way ticket to Gatwick.
There is one more exam to pass in the UK, called an objective structured clinical examination (OSCE). That meant that when I first came here, while studying for it, I was working in a healthcare assistant role, even though I was already an experienced nurse.
The support that the Filipino community gave my cohort after we arrived was very warm. They helped us with everything from preparing for the OSCE to figuring out the transport system, which is
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