New accreditation path will get more foreign-trained health-care professionals working in Manitoba: province

The Manitoba government is developing a new path to accreditation that it says will help all internationally educated health-care professionals to work in their field, including the nurses dealing with what one NDP cabinet minister calls the worst accreditation process in the country.

Labour and Immigration Minister Malaya Marcelino said the province will develop an accreditation stream exclusively for foreign-trained health-care workers living in the province.

"People don't just come off of a plane anymore to try their luck to be a nurse. They've already been recruited in other provinces and in other jurisdictions all over the world," she told CBC News in an interview last month.

"That's another reason why — and because of the equity concerns — that we have to come up with a pathway [to accreditation] for Manitobans, because they're already here anyway."

Marcelino's office provided few details details, but said regulatory bodies would still be responsible for accreditation under the new government-run pathway. 

Each health-care profession has a licensing and registration body that recognizes foreign credentials, but the processes are often criticized as lengthy, expensive and onerous.

In particular, Marcelino blasted the College of Registered Nurses of Manitoba for not doing enough to accredit nurses. 

Manitoba "unfortunately is, I want to say, the worst jurisdiction currently for accreditation for internationally educated nurses," she said.

"That is the hole that we're climbing out of."

Deb Elias, chief executive officer and registrar at the nurses' college, said the regulator is continuing to improve its processes, but thinks there is "definitely some opportunity" in the new pathway proposed by the government. 

One idea the college is considering is more frequently waiving the clinical competence assessment — a days-long exam widely condemned for being too challenging — and replacing it with another assessment of prior learning. The test requires most internationally trained nurses to take more education.

"If we're focusing on [internationally educated nurses] who've lived in Manitoba for a period of time and haven't been engaged in the registration process … depending on the amount of time that they've been out of practice, it may be difficult for them to go through an assessment like that," Elias said.

Monika Matera had six years of nursing education in her home country of Germany, but now works at a mine in northern Manitoba — including a short stint underground.

She's never stopped wanting to be a nurse.