Quebec, El Dorado of French Nurses

More and more nurses are choosing to go and work in Quebec. Despite some drawbacks, they find better working conditions and better recognition there. This is the choice of franceinfo.

While there is a shortage of nurses in France, several hundred of them leave each year to work in Quebec. Teams from the Quebec Ministry of Health come to France every year to recruit them and the applicants find it so profitable that some decide to stay and live there.

It all started at the nurses’ fair in Paris, a favorite hunting ground for the Recrutement Santé Québec teams. A delegation from the Quebec Ministry of Health came here to poach French nurses and they had no trouble convincing Vanessa Desmarets. She was a nurse in a large Parisian hospital. “In France I worked for four and a half years, I found myself working night shifts, sometimes alternating with day shifts, so I found myself with 16-hour work days, little break time, sometimes no meals, I hesitated between quitting the nursing profession given that I did not see any other career choice for me than critical care.”

Once the candidate is selected, the Recrutement Santé Québec team takes care of everything: visa application, work permit, location of the integration internship, and it goes even further. “It’s not just professional integration, there’s social integration too”underlines Luc Mathieu, president of the Order of Nurses in Quebec. “Some people come with their spouse, their children too, so we have to take care of that aspect too.”

“It’s not just about attracting them, we have to keep them, give them working conditions. For example, if someone says that geriatrics is what interests them, we should make them work in that sector and not in a sector in which they have no interest.”

Luc Mathieu, President of the Order of Nurses in Quebec

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Quebec offers such advantageous working conditions for nurses that Malou Leroy regained a taste for the profession when she arrived here. “We have time to do our work, to support the patient, to support the families, that’s what I missed most in France”. “We have five patients for one nurse, in France for example in Surgery I had 15 patients in my care. Here we are much better paid, with doctors it is totally different, we are recognized at our true value”. A “good job” which, depending on the position, pays 30 to 50% more than in France.

But there is also a downside because in Quebec, not everything is rosy for nurses either. The big black mark is the mandatory overtime at the hospital with mandatory and unpredictable shifts. A constraint that Claire de Coninck could not bear. “You know when you come into work, but you don’t know exactly when you’re leaving. If there’s a shortage of staff on the next shift, you can’t go home. It’s a bit of a hostage feeling sometimes.”

“Here is the North American culture in which we resort more quickly to the judicial aspect when there is an issue, so in terms of paperwork it creates files that never end.”

Claire de Coninck, nurse

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In Quebec, progression within a hospital is based on seniority. If you leave to work elsewhere, you start again at the bottom of the ladder.

Despite these drawbacks, more and more French nurses are leaving for Quebec since their diploma has been recognized there. 500 French nurses left this year and in four years the number of work permits issued has increased fivefold. There are a total of 2,400 French nurses and if Quebec is going to such great lengths to get them, it is because they also have many qualities, explains Viviane Fournier, professor of health sciences at the Université du Québec en Abitibi-Temiscamingue.

“We are always impressed by their body of knowledge, they are highly valued in the care teams, they have a lot of leadership and often have access to positions as advisors, head nurses, because they have this confidence and this professional solidity.”

Viviane Fournier, professor of health sciences at the University of Quebec

to franceinfo

In Quebec, nurses have many opportunities for advancement. Malou Leroy started her own business, as did Claire de Coninck, before working in an oncology clinic, and Desborah Desmare will receive a one-year scholarship to train in neurology, a dream she would not have been able to achieve in France.