Filipino nurses set to start work at East Sussex Healthcare NHS Trust

The Trust has welcomed a group of 13 Filipino nurses who have arrived to take up staff nurse positions at Conquest Hospital and Eastbourne DGH.

The nurses will spend a week being introduced into the organisation and will then start working on the wards. This will initially be as unregistered nurses whilst they undertake training to pass the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) exam for their full NMC registration, which we hope they will achieve in May.

Alice Webster, Director of Nursing said: “We are really delighted to have the first of the Philippine nurse cohort arrive with us, and we hope that they will quickly settle in and enjoy the experience of working in the Trust. They represent part of our commitment to increase the number of registered nurses in the Trust, and you will very soon see them on the wards and in departments delivering care to our patients.”

There is a further cohort of 22 nurses who will arrive by June 2016 and the Trust is returning to the Philippines for another recruitment drive in May. In addition to the recruitment of nurses from the Philippines, an addition nine nurses have been recruited from Europe and started last month, with a further eleven arriving during April and May. Also a successful recruitment trip to Croatia took place last month and resulted in 23 job offers being made to qualified nurses, who are expected to begin work in May.