Getting staff nurses into US hospitals

All fifty US states are short of nurses. In warmer California, Nevada, Florida, Texas or Arizona where retirees prefer to reside, the scarcity is felt not only in hospitals and doctors’ clinics but more in care homes. For the 260 members of the Louisiana Nursing Home Association, it’s crunch time. Before two destructive hurricanes struck in 2005, the New Orleans capital alone already lacked 900 nurses of all types. Eight months after, 16 of 60 old folks’ homes remained shut and 30 could not resume full operation because their staff had fled the state. LNHA executive director Joseph Donchess estimates their present state-wide need at 3,000 Certified Nurse Aides, 1,000 Licensed Practical Nurses, and 200 Registered Nurses. Their only hope is in graduates of foreign nursing schools.

On the other side of the Pacific is a reverse situation. Nurses abound in the Philippines, yet not enough hospitals, clinics or convalescent shelters can accommodate them. With America and Europe recruiting about 15,000 per year since the ’70s, more youths take the four-year RN college course in the hope of overseas placement. About a tenth of each year’s 32,000 new RNs also pass the US-Nursing Council Licensure Examination (NCLEX) on the first try. Still they need to go through a rigorous process before landing that coveted US job.

The clog is with US immigration authorities. The 9/11 attacks added homeland security on top of employment balancing among their concerns. It now takes close to a year to process an RN, although the position is top priority. LPNs who finish 12- to 18-month courses must wait longer, due to immigration preference for college grads. Meanwhile, industry leaders like Donchess lament that 28,000 frail residents of Louisiana direly need nurse care from much-preferred Filipinos.

To unclog the flow of nurses, the Louisiana clinics are writing their senators and congressmen for relief. They want the issuance of work visas to foreign RNs and labor certificates to LPNs sped up. The state board of nursing is considering having the foreign recruits take their licensure tests in state, if only to immediately bridge the hiring gap. Nevada and Texas are observing if the same can be done for their shortages.

On this side, Arthur Lacuesta as LPN educator is asking government officials to help get Filipinos employed in America. Assurances need to be made by the labor and foreign departments so the US would expedite the dispatch of Filipino nurses to waiting jobs. Work contracts need not be lengthy to avoid grumblings by US legislators against the steep rise in immigrants. As Donhess says, what they need is a "supply of workers who can come to the US, work for three to six years, then return to their land with savings that will allow them to lead a better life." What the Philippines needs, on the other hand, is simply gainful employment for four million unemployed. If fixed-period labor exchanges can be inked with Japan and Korea, the same could be suggested to US authorities who must solve their nursing shortage anyway. Perhaps Philippine legislators, fond of meddling in executive affairs, can help too, but then that’s asking too much.

(Two passers of the NCLEX for practical nurse went to my DWIZ radio show last Saturday to inquire about immigration. But educator Lacuesta and LPN leader Gregory Howard of the US-Commission on Graduates of Foreign Nursing Schools, whom I interviewed, are experts only on training and employment. Representing many of Filipinos with the same life story, Irene is an engineering grad and Mel finished economics. Young, comely and articulate in English; both took up the LPN course as a shorter route to a good job. They’re still waiting for it, though. Lacuesta wishes that all LPN schools, like his Philippine Paramedic and Technical School, would make it their moral duty to help the graduates find jobs after collecting tuition.)

While waiting for US immigration to clear, most Filipino LPNs can only re-enroll for "laddering" bachelor degrees in nursing. Some seek local employment in hospitals; unfortunately though, the Philippines does not recognize the LPN profession. Another option is to dream that US care homes, tired of the nursing shortage, relocate to tropical countries like the Philippines. But with the kind of political leaders we have, that’s unlikely; avoiding political turmoil, investors would rather go to Malaysia, Thailand or even Vietnam. To begin with, that’s the reason there aren’t enough jobs for nurses and other professionals in the Philippines, and why nine of every ten Filipinos desire to leave.

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For more on the US nursing shortage and work opportunities, catch Linawin Natin, tonight at 11:45, on IBC-13.

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The NBI has found two ranking Customs officials criminally liable for the theft of four shipping vans of smuggled, confiscated Chinese pork. Both chief of staff James Enriquez and auction head Facundo Bitanga report directly to Customs chief Napoleon Morales. Enriquez directly oversees the Sigma special private warehouse where the contraband was stolen. Bitanga wrote the plan to bury the meat in Pampanga allegedly to conceal the heist.

A third officer is endorsed for administrative raps. Alexander Arcilla, head of Morales’s anti-smuggling task force, did not bother to inventory the shipment upon discovery of the diseased meat. A fourth official, Port of Manila collector Horacio Suansing, is still being probed for complicity by ordering forfeiture and burying of the meat only as prelude to the theft.

Morales has been cleared so far, although it was he who appointed Sigma as the rent-free special storage of all confiscated goods in the Manila harbor prime estate. The appointing memo was signed solely by Morales, with no conformity from the Sigma "owners", thus raising doubt if they truly are proprietors or mere fronts.

Upon release of the NBI report, Morales said he did not believe that his men, because never charged before, could commit crime. He gave the impression that no one can complain anymore to the Office of the Customs Commissioner, since he mechanically will defend his subalterns.

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