Agency helps foreign-trained nurses qualify to work here
May 9, 2011
Raveena Aulakh
STAFF REPORTER
All that Lia Musetti wanted was to be a Registered Nurse in Ontario. But she was convinced it would never, ever happen.
The 49-year-old RN from Sao Paulo, Brazil immigrated to Toronto in 1996 and, on at least three occasions, ordered a package from the College of Nurses of Ontario about how to upgrade her education. Every time, she would look at the pile of papers and shake her head dismally. “It seemed hard, almost impossible.”
Then in 2004, Musetti decided she had to get back into nursing and signed up for a two-year Registered Practical Nursing program at George Brown College. But after two years of practising, she realized her heart wasn’t in it — she wanted to be an RN. She mustered the courage and finally started the process to get her license in Ontario.
It wasn’t easy: the College of Nurses wanted her to take 17 credits. Musetti was on the verge of giving up on her dream forever when she heard about the Creating Access to Regulated Employment, better known by its acronym CARE. In the end, she took three credits and was helped with exam preparation. Within months, she had cleared all her exams and now works for St. Elizabeth Healthcare as a community nurse.
“I love it and I couldn’t have done it without CARE,” she says.
Almost 10 per cent of the province’s registered nurses and practical nurses received their initial training outside Canada. CARE was launched in 2001 to help them get accredited to work here.
Initially funded through a grant from the Ministry of Training, Colleges and Universities, it now receives money from the Ontario Ministry of Citizenship and Immigration.
“CARE provides support to international nurses who immigrate to Ontario and want to pursue the profession,” explains Zubeida Ramji, executive director of the organization.
Most have a lot of experience but they have to go through a regulatory process and meet requirements of the College of Nurses. “CARE helps navigate the system so that these internationally educated nurses have greater chances of becoming successful in a reasonable period of time,” says Ramji.
CARE has helped more than 1,000 internationally educated nurses, representing more than 140 countries. Ramji says many are from Philippines, India, China and Iran.
The amount of time it takes the nurses to get licensed here depends on their nursing education and experience. “CARE doesn’t have any control over that,” says Ramji. The college does the assessment and tells them what they need to do. Some complete the process in as few as four months, but most take about 18 to 20 months.
It’s not easy though. Elzbieta Lata, 42, an RN in Poland, immigrated to Canada in 2005. It was even tougher for her because she didn’t speak fluent English. “That was my first step: to learn English,” says Lata, adding it took her almost two years to get fluent in the language.
Then she started checking around about how to become an RN. She was told she could become a Registered Practical Nurse right away or she could go back to school and study to be an RN.
Lata didn’t have much money “so the practical thing to do was to get credentials for RPN, find a good job and go back to school at the same time,” she says. She is now working as a practical nurse and attending classes at York University. “It’s going beautifully.”
Whenever Musetti hears about an RN who has recently immigrated to Canada, she tells them to go straight to CARE. “I wasted a lot of time, years actually, because I thought it was too hard to get the licence here and because I thought there was no one to help. I don’t want others to make the same mistakes. I tell people to go to CARE first and then elsewhere.”
Courses, exam prep and job shadowing
So how exactly does the CARE Centre help?
It helps with language training and exam preparation through workshops, mentoring and observational job shadowing.
“When someone comes to us for the first time, we assess their education and experience and tell them to go to the College of Nurses of Ontario,” says executive director Zubeida Ramji.
Once they hear back from the college and know what they have to do to get a licence, CARE assigns a case manager who acts as adviser and mentor at every step.
“Every situation is unique,” says Ramji. “The college provides the individual with a letter of direction and what a CARE manager does is dissect the letter and translate that into action for the nurse. Our managers make it clear what the nurses will have to do to be an RN in the province.”
The college indicates what the gaps are but most people don’t know what to do or where to go, explains Ramji. “Our case managers understand the requirements of nurses and they know the different needs.”
CARE charges $100 for a membership fee, $325 for a language course and $300 for an exam preparation course. If a student wants to shadow an RN on the job, CARE makes those arrangements for three to five shifts.
“Our language and communication courses are in the nursing and health context,” adds Ramji. “When an internationally educated nurse has met all exam requirements, she/he can then take the exam preparation course. It helps like nothing else.”
The centre has worked with almost 1,500 people in 10 years and at least 1,000 have been successful, says Ramji. “We have an 80-per-cent success rate for nurses writing their exam the first time. Only 35 per cent used to clear at one point so this is great progress.”
— Raveena Aulakh