Researchers survey international nurses

To describe the recruitment experience of foreign-educated U.S. health professionals (FEHPs), researchers surveyed FEHPs recruited between 2015 and 2017 and interviewed a smaller sample of foreign-educated nurses (FENs). Writing in the American Journal of Nursing, the researchers shared evidence of “progress relative to the ethical recruitment” of FEHPs. The yearly inflow of FENs to the United States has dropped dramatically in recent years, to fewer than 6,500 in 2015 from about 24,000 in 2007. This decline is due largely to two factors: the last economic recession and visa retrogression. The latter factor results in severely restricting the number of visas available to foreign nationals from source countries with large numbers of nurses. The study’s authors are affiliated with CGFNS International, Inc., which evaluates the credentials of nurses and allied health professionals educated outside the United States.