Federal efforts to address nursing shortages by bringing in immigrant health care workers are yielding uneven results, according to new data from the Department of Immigration. Backlock's Reporter says about a quarter of immigrants admitted as prospective nurses were not employed in the field.The report, Immigrant Nurses In Canada: Alignment Between Intentions And Employment Outcomes, analyzed a decade of data from 2010 to 2020. It found that 63% of economic principal applicants aged 18 to 54 who intended to work as nurses were employed in nursing by 2021, while 25% worked in lower-skilled health or non-health roles, or were unemployed. Pre-admission Canadian work experience was a strong predictor of success..Immigrants who found nursing jobs were typically younger women with English language skills and at least a bachelor’s degree. Researchers noted that immigrants from Asia, who made up 84% of those intending to work as nurses, had lower employment rates in nursing compared with immigrants from the Caribbean, Central and South America, the U.S., and Europe. No specific reason was given.The report calls for enhanced resources, policies, and programs to help immigrants entering the nursing profession, particularly those without prior Canadian experience, and to address social, educational, and professional challenges..Canada currently faces a shortage of 28,000 registered nurses, the Department of Health reported in June, with the Covid-19 pandemic worsening workloads, burnout, and turnover. Across the health sector, only 58% of 198,000 internationally educated health professionals are employed in their trained field, highlighting persistent gaps in workforce integration.Researchers warn that, without targeted reforms, nursing and other health care occupations will continue to experience growing shortages, even as federal programs bring foreign-trained workers to Canada.
