Migration of nurses in Australia: where and why?

The Australian health care workforce has benefited from an increasing migration of nurses over the past decades. The nursing profession is the largest single health profession, making up over half of the Australian health care workforce. Migration of nurses into the Australian nursing workforce impacts significantly on the size of the workforce and the capacity to provide health care to the Australian multicultural community. Migration of nurses plays an important role in providing a solution to the ongoing challenges of workforce attraction and retention, hence an understanding of the factors contributing to nurse migration is important. This paper will critically analyse factors reported to impact on migration of nurses to Australia, in particular in relation to: (1) globalisation; (2) Australian society and nursing workforce; and (3) personal reasons. The current and potential implications of nurse migration are not limited to the Australian health care workforce, but also extend to political, socioeconomic and other aspects in Australia.