Tashylou

Hi everyone, (Alert: long post, sorry! )

Just looking for some advice really. I am a paediatric nurse and my partner a mental health nurse. We both have degrees and currently at least a years experience. We have started the process with a migration agent and are looking to get a 189.

We are wondering when to start our registration process with AHPRA, I understand a lot of it is up in the air at the moment with new requirements of overseas nurses, and that it is taking months for registration to be granted, I just wondered what people's experiences are?

Also we worry that we may get the visa, but then be refused registration? I have heard about diploma nurses with years experience being refused, but has anyone heard anything about degree nurses being refused? As part of our visa process we will be having a skills assessment (I'm guessing it will be through ANMAC) so am assuming this will use the new points scale that AHPRA have bought in to check our training against there's.

We also wondered if there were any issues with paediatric or mental health nurses gaining registration as they were sole trained in that area? Does it make much difference? Obviously we are only looking to work in the areas we trained in.

Any nurses who have been or are going through this process please get in touch, it is such a minefield, I need to know that this is possible and all the hard work and stress will be worth it haha

I apologise for the long late night post!

Pollyana

AHPRA have no real timeline, some people get through fast others are very slow.
The new so-called international criminal history check' may slow down the process but ts so nw=ew that no-one is really sure, so I would start it as soon as you can!

AHPRA now doesn't seem to accept UK diploma trained nurses but you should be OK with a degree Its not based on years of experience, they just don't consider a diploma is good enough, so they want degrees instead.

I'm sure others will come along who are actually engaged in the process, but thats a start for you anyway

Tashylou

Thank you.

genorm

I understand the average time for the new Police Check is 3 weeks for UK. But it is VERY expensive, an evil necessity of course. Maybe you should ask your Australian Registered Migration Agent if they can accept your (AHPRA initialised) International Criminal History Check for Visa purposes. If you go down the ANMAC route you will also have to provide one to them, and most employing hospitals will require one as well. Thats FOUR Police Checks - not really a very "migrant friendly" start to your process!

Pollyana

Not sure whether ANMAC and the individual hospitals would accept it, but DIBP won't for the visa - it has to be a check from ACRO for visa purposes, no others will do.

genorm

It's ridiculous - its all one country - just AHPRA being pathetic as usual!

Tashylou

Hi both,

It's been a while. Just thought I'd post an update of our process so far.

Since my last post I have had a positive skilled assessment from anmac which is fab. It was much faster than I anticipated. It took a while to get to that point as I moved home, started a new job and had to have my reference redone about a million times, but it was worth it, completed with no hiccups!!

The next step with my immigration agent is the expression of interest which we are intending to do in the new year. I need to sit ielts again :/ got the scores for anmac but not for visa points, my own fault for not revising :-( so fingers crossed that will be done in January.

I know the dreaded ahpra application is looming...

Has anyone recently gone through the process? If so how long did it take and were there any hiccups? This is where the hard work and stress starts I believe lol!!

I look forward to hearing from you :-)

mgreaves

With regards to IELTS I was in the same siutation, I had enough ponits for my skills assessment but not the points I needed for the visa. I really struggeld with IELTS and only improved my mark by 0.5 on my 2nd sitting. However for visa ponits you can do PTE-A which has a very quick turn around from booking to results, I got maximum marks on this so I would recommend you try this if you are struggling with IELTS.

I have just received my visa grant this morning, so having IELTS for skills assessment and PTE-A for visa points is perfectly acceptable!

As to AHPRA, this should be fairly straightforward if you have ANAMC, the documents you need are mostly the same, if you can submit everything correct first time it takes about 2 months.

Do not forget to request COGS from NMC now as it takes a few weeks after asking for it before you can actually pay. Also you need to do the Fit 2 Work police checks before you apply as well. I assume you have all the university stuff so these 2 pieces will be most time consuming.

Tashylou

Thank you for your reply. I read all about your journey last night on another thread, there was lots of information, so again thank you.

We have to have a police check for the visa, can we just use the same one?

I'm hoping the police check and the nmc are the only things we have to worry about. I'm stressing about criteria 8, pharmacology, I know we did it but there's nothing on my transcript actually stating it :-( when I asked the uni for anmac they said it was a national requirement of all degree courses. So fingers crossed maybe a cover letter from them stating this may support it.

When are you heading down under? Is everything sorted? Bet your both very excited :-)

mgreaves

No, AHPRA have their own seperate police check, when you arrive and start looking for a job you will also most likely need to do antoher police check then!

For the pharmacology Uni sent us a letter stating that x y z as per the AHPRA website was taught and is a requirement for all UK nursing courses as per some EU directives, this was certified and included with the AHPRA application and seemed to tick their boxes.

Our flights are booked for 3rd June heading to Sydeny, I think we may end up in Melbourne though eventually, we are actually planning to travel for 6-12 mnoths before looking for work (as long as money permits) so still a lot of planning to do and importantly the house to sell!

Tashylou

Gosh, police checks coming out of our ears then!!! These little things all add up massively. :/ I thought we could ease off on the overtime haha!

O that's great news about criteria 8, that's the one thing that's been bothering me since I started looking at the new changes from ahpra. Glad to hear someone have a nice smooth journey with them.

Oooo very exciting stuff! Planning is fun though, especially when it's a big exciting journey :-) all the best with the house sale and travelling plans. I'm sure I'll need to pick your brains in the new year when we tackle ahpra :-) thanks again!