Factors Associated with Nursing Student’s Intention to Leave Own Country

Abstract

The worldwide migration of nursing professionals from low income countries to rich ones is very common as nurses fill the large number of vacancies in upper income country. A study was conducted to explore the various reasons (factors) associated with nursing students’ intention to leave own country. Data was collected from undergraduate nursing students, GNM, post basic and B.Sc., of Saraswati Nursing Institute, Punjab. Findings revealed that 63.23% of study participants would like to start their professional career abroad with a mean and SD score of associated reasons were 7.5±1.5 respectively. The most common reasons (factors) associated with nursing students’ intention to leave own country reported by the nursing students were better placement, money attraction, better career opportunities, job problems in India, poor status of nurses in India, job security in abroad, for higher education, corruption in nursing, family already settled in abroad, and want to marry with NRI. The study concluded that majority of the nursing students intend to start their professional career in developed countries for number of reasons which indicate high probability of brain drain among Indian professional nurses.