Globalization Impacts on Nursing
Today we live in the age of information. This is why knowledge is getting more and more valuable in the globalizing world with its expansions, mergers, and integrations. As a result, the demand for education in a number of professional fields has experienced a rapid growth. Nursing is one of such fields. Due to the growing demand for education all over the world, lots of educational facilities responded with the growing offering. This made education generally much more available on both local and international levels. Technological progress facilitated the ease of access to education by means of allowing online courses and classes held through the internet. Moreover, in the contemporary world education is a profitable and popular business, in the globalized world it is viewed as an investment, a valuable service and a commodity that can be exported (Baumann & Blythe, 2008).
Besides, since to the mutual integration of societies and cultures is an essential attribute of globalization, education, just like medicine and nursing, became one of the spheres that is to address the changes happening in the modern society. Education in all disciplines including nursing faced the issue of cultural diversity and eventually was pushed towards internalization. The concept of internalization has penetrated the sphere of education not so long ago, it came from such disciplines as political sciences and international relations. From the perspective of education, internalization refers to the integration of intercultural aspects of education in order to improve the universality, accessibility and suitability of education on the international level (Baumann & Blythe, 2008). Internationalization of nursing education would allow the professionals to practice medicine all around the world and avoid the difficulty of getting licensed every time they relocate. Internationalization of nursing education would make the delivery of nursing services easier and allow addressing one of the most important healthcare problems of the modern society – the shortage of nursing professionals all around the world that is projected to become more severe in the next several decades.
Education Export and Nurse Migration
The process of globalization causes the modern labor market to expand. Due to the technological progress and the development of certain spheres, the world’s demand for professionals in these areas increases. Currently, among the most needed specialists there are the IT professionals, managers and business administrators, engineers, medical workers and nurses. In the contemporary world there are countries that serve as the sources of nursing professionals for the other states. Among these countries there are the United Kingdom, the United States of America and Australia. They are the leaders at training nursing experts. The education is distributed in several different ways. First of all, students can travel and acquire education abroad. Secondly, the Internet provides a wide range of opportunities for distance learning. Thirdly, many countries have the educational facilities that conduct onsite classes in other countries building branch campuses. To support the development of the modern education and make it even more accessible, multiple non-profit organizations are involved into the process. They work with a specific goal to prepare specialists for work abroad. The number of such organizations has been growing for the last several years and this is why the need for standardized professional education became one of the most frequently discusses educational issue today (Baumann & Blythe, 2008).
Nursing education and practice differ in various countries. Regardless of the differences, many nursing professionals move around the world in search for employment and in most cases find it successfully. As a result, some of the countries have developed a deliberate practice of preparation of nurses for export (Baumann & Blythe, 2008). For this, they release an excessive number of nurses and send them to practice abroad. This is done as a way to improve the domestic economies of the source states. This practice is undertaken in such developing countries as India, and the Philippines, besides, Korea and China are starting to join this tendency which is supported by the large populations of these states (Baumann & Blythe, 2008).
The Need for Harmonization
Nursing as a sphere of healthcare services and a profession has existed for centuries. Globalization gradually helped nursing to spread all over the world. In the 20th century the profession has faced a number of challenges. The two World Wars in a row caused a significant shortage of nursing specialists, and the following population growth and baby booms increased the number of potential patients. As a result, today nursing shortage is a serious problem. The preparation of nurses for migration seems like a good solution to this issue, yet there are a number of obstacles that prevent the migration creating difficulties for the nurses seeking employment abroad. For example, the procedures in Canadian nursing, licensing and testing of the specialists arriving from abroad deprive most of the nurses coming to Canada for employment. The licensing examination causes them to fail, and as a result most of the migrating nurses never re-establish their licenses there. This way, the Canadian attempt to maintain high standards in nursing enforces the shortage of professionals.
To be successful, the policies concerning licensing of migrating nurses and their integration into the labor market have to be agreed on by both the recipients and the senders of nursing professionals. For that, a number of bridging programs making sure that the professionals prepared for migrations are competent and have high chances to find employment abroad. Besides, many colleges deliver education specific to the demands of the recipient states and educates the future not only about their practice features but also about their cultures. Organizations such as the Commission on Graduate of Foreign Nursing Schools (CGFNS) are dedicated to assisting nurses to their countries and providing guidance to the migrating nurses (Baumann & Blythe, 2008).
Reference
Baumann, A. & Blythe, J. (2008). Globalization of Higher Education in Nursing. Online Journal of Issues in Nursing, 13(2).