Becoming a Canadian Nurse With International Experience: Workplace Integration of Internationally Educated Nurses in the Global North

Abstract

The inequitable distribution of nurses globally compels high-income countries like Canada to ensure that internationally educated nurses gain professional satisfaction and stay in nursing. To fill a critical gap in nursing literature, the authors conducted a qualitative case study of an inner-city teaching hospital in Canada, to examine workplace integration of IENs beyond the transition phase. They found that workplace integration is a “two-way” process, which has implications for interventions at both the individual IEN and organizational levels. The workplace organizational context requires deliberate “policies promoting equity principles” and when an IEN is integrated, s/he has worked hard to go beyond the transition phase and get recognized as “a Canadian nurse with international experience”. Understanding these individual and organizational factors is essential for how nurses educated in another country especially in the global south, can be successfully integrated in healthcare settings in the global north.