THE report into the nursing

crisis at Eastbourne this week focused on staff shortages. While bosses were criticised for not properly addressing the problem, other hospitals are trying to tackle it by taking on overseas nurses and tempting back those who have left the profession. Rachel Palmer, left, investigates.

NURSING has taken a battering in Britain. As a profession, it has become synonymous with long hours, stress, violence and the wary acceptance of not having enough workers to run wards safely.

This week, a top-level NHS report into nursing standards at Eastbourne District General Hospital found the shortage of qualified nurses with a balance of skills was instrumental in the deaths of two patients.

Some hospitals are spreading their recruitment net further afield to avoid similar problems.

Nurses in countries such as South Africa, Australia and the Philippines see working in Britain as a valuable professional experience, with skills polished in demanding UK hospitals translating into promotions at home. Hospitals in Brighton and Hastings have recruited nurses from

overseas and found their knowledge and expertise invaluable.

Juliet Pasinag, from the Philippines, has 12 years of nursing experience and is now working at the Royal Sussex County

Hospital in Brighton.

Rather than having to get her head round how a hospital works and what must be done in an emergency, as a trainee would, Juliet has only really had to feel her way through the slight differences any person would find in a new job.

She said: "For me, working here is a great opportunity to take something back to the Philippines.

"They have helped us settle in. If you're not happy here, you can't look after people."

Some things seem to be the same everywhere. Juliet said that unfortunately, issues such as stress and understaffing are global.

But she has found differences. In the Philippines, hospitals group medical specialities together more, so nurses gain a range of experience working on one ward. But, in Brighton, patients are organised in specific wards.

She also said in her home country a patient's family plays much more of a role in hospital care, with relatives and loved ones sitting with patients, helping staff find out how they feel and what they need.

Racism

Brighton Health Care NHS Trust, which runs the Royal Sussex, needs to fill 139 nursing vacancies. So far it has employed 72 nurses from the Philippines and 20 from South Africa.

Lily Motsepe, from Pretoria, South Africa's administrative capital, has been a nurse for 18 years.

She speaks 11 languages and has seen her country's bleakest days of racism as a black nurse on South African hospital wards.

She remembers less-qualified white nurses being paid more than she was, and white patients refusing to be treated by her.

She has found the smaller problems of settling in at the Royal Sussex slightly daunting - asking where equipment is kept and working out different trade names.

She said: "There was just the basic culture shock. I was a bit stressed here at first, wondering what I was allowed to do and not actually knowing.

"But the induction course was excellent. After a while I felt relieved.

"I am impressed with social services in the UK. You can't leave the hospital before they make sure you are safe where you are going."

Maggie Ritson, an English nurse who returned to work after a six-month break, forms another arm of the trust's recruitment - drawing back nurses who have left the profession.

She left nursing when she moved from Chichester, and is enjoying nursing again in Brighton. But she fears there may always be problems with poor morale.

She explained: "Your confidence goes as much as anything else after time away.

"It's just the sheer pressure on the wards. There's a lot of pressure to get patients out so you can get other patients in. Often at the end of the day you wish you could have done more.

"How do you get nurses' morale back? I don't know what the solution is."

Trust recruitment coordinator, Wendy Dearing, said the use of nurses from the Philippines and South Africa has filled vital gaps, and exposed British nurses to different skills.

But she said ultimately the trust wants to restore confidence in the profession with young women and men looking for career choices here, and show them nursing still has a lot to offer.

She said: "Overseas recruitment is not the answer to nursing as a profession. What we're trying to do is use the strategy in the short term."

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