Factors impacting the retention of Registered Nurses recruited from India to work in South African hospitals: A case study

Registered Nurses recruited from India are a critical component of the South African nursing workforce and their retention is vital. Understand the obstacles and remediation required to retain the Registered Nurses recruited from India, and explore the hospital managements’ perceptions of these nurses’ contribution to their hospitals’ functioning. There is a paucity of published literature in terms of the retention of Registered Nurses recruited from other countries. Instrumental case study. Eight urban and rural South African towns. Two groups, namely 30 Registered Nurses recruited from India and 37 hospital management members from the hospitals where these nurses were employed. Data was collected via individual interviews for the Registered Nurses and focus group discussions for the hospital management teams. The data suggests that the obstacles are related to the financial wellbeing and the quality of the work and private lives of the Registered Nurses recruited from India. The data further suggests that it is the hospital managements’ perceptions that these Registered Nurses contribute towards the functioning of their hospital through their clinical skills and leadership, professionalism, serving as mentors and role models for the host country staff. The greatest retention challenge lies in the deteriorating exchange rate and associated cost of living increases in the host country which would need mitigation. Although the management was concerned about the communication capability of these nurses before their arrival, these Registered Nurses showed that competence negates the impact of language.