INO warning The number of vacant nursing positions within the health service is set to rise to "well in excess of 2,000" within the next 18 months, the Irish Nurses Organisation (INO) has warned. There are currently some 700 vacancies writes Theresa Judge.
INO general secretary Liam Doran said that unless "something radical" was done, the system would face "extreme difficulties". Particular problems are expected next year because there will be no qualifying group in 2005 due to nurse training changing from a three- to a four-year programme.
Despite the fact that more nurses are being trained in Ireland than ever before - 1,730 started their nursing degree last September compared with 900 in 1998 - some 70 per cent of these leave the system within two years of qualifying and the health service is becoming increasingly reliant on foreign nurses. Efforts are continuing to recruit nurses from non-EU countries including India and South Africa.
Mr Doran said evidence was mounting that Filipino nurses had become disenchanted with Ireland and were now leaving for better paid jobs in countries such as the US, Australia and the Middle East. He said that while there were some 4,200 Filipino nurses working in the Republic, some 800 had already left. "We have blotted our copy book with the Filipinos because of the way we treated the first cohort over the past four years," he said.
He said the INO regarded as "ethically questionable" the fact that the Irish health service was now trying to "poach" nurses from India and South Africa, countries that did not have enough nurses to meet their own needs. The Philippines always trained more nurses than it could employ, he said.
A similar warning about Ireland's ability to go on attracting foreign nurses was made at a conference in Dublin last Friday by the director of the Royal College of Nursing in Northern Ireland, Martin Bradley. There are currently 460 vacant nursing positions in the North. He said that both Ireland and the UK would face "significant challenges" over the next 10 years in recruiting enough nurses and doctors to maintain current services.
Mr Bradley said it was estimated that the US needed to recruit an additional one million nurses by 2012 and generous inducements were being offered. He had heard of one instance where a $20,000 (€16,429) lump sum was given to new recruits.
"Both in Ireland and the UK we are becoming very reliant on nurses from overseas, but we can't be sure that we are going to continue to be their destination of choice," Mr Bradley said.
He said it was not surprising that the US and Australia would be keen to recruit nurses from countries such as the Philippines who had spent time in Ireland or the UK. He told the conference, Transforming Healthcare in the New Europe, held at the National College of Ireland IFSC campus, that changing demographics would also contribute to shortages of nurses as there would be more older people requiring care and fewer school leavers to train as nurses.
Mr Bradley also pointed out that the historic trend of nurses going from the Republic to the UK had been reversed dramatically. In the year 2000/1 only 192 nurses from the Republic went to the UK but 1,133 UK-based nurses sought registration in the Republic. Similar figures were recorded the following year.
Mr Doran said this trend had come about as a result of new specialist posts being created in the Republic during those years and this had succeeded in attracting Irish nurses home. He said he believed that more recent cutbacks and embargoes on posts had put an end to this trend.
He said "massive efforts" were now needed to retain nurses trained in Ireland and also to retain newly recruited nurses from outside the EU. Of the 70 per cent of Irish-trained nurses who leave within two years, he said it was "a myth" to say that they go away for a few years and then return. "The proof of that is that we now need 5,000 foreign nurses although we are training enough nurses for the Irish system," he said. The only way to retain nurses was to raise salaries and to compensate for the high cost of living in Dublin, he said.
Mr Doran said the one "unknown factor" in the supply of nurses was the possibility that people would come to Ireland from the 10 new EU member-states. However, since they joined on May 1st, just 108 nurses have applied to come here.