Filipino Nursing Herald

Let me just make a short shoutout for Filipino war veterans. My grandfather was a veteran of the second world war and when I was growing up, we used to hunt down news together about anything related to war vets' affairs. My grandfather passed away a couple of years ago, but I'm still here hunting down news. He would have liked this particular story that came out in the Inquirer today: The United States Senate veterans committee on Thursday approved a bill that would provide a special set of benefits for Filipino World War II veterans as well as others who had fought under the US flag. Philippine Ambassador to Washington Willy Gaa said in a statement released by the Department of Foreign Affairs that Senate Bill No. 1315, or the Omnibus Benefits Bill, was approved in a special hearing conducted by the committee at the Dirksen Building on Capitol Hill. The report continued: The US Senate version of the bill provides for a minimum annual pension of $3,600 for a Filipino World War ...

Marco Sto. Tomas, a commissioner on the Board of Nursing of the Professional Regulatory Commission, told the Inquirer today that results of the June 2007 nursing board exam will probably come out between Aug. 15 to Aug. 31. Around 78,000 nursing graduates took this year's exam on June 11-12, including 13,000 examinees who passed the leakage-marred June 2006 nursing boards but had to re-take Tests 3 and 5, where questions were allegedly leaked to examinees. The re-take was recommended by the U.S. Commission on Graduates of Foreign Nursing Schools (CGFNS) which made it mandatory for June 2006 passers who want to be issued Visascreen certificates, a requirement for U.S. immigration applications. Earlier, the Department of Labor and Employment said it would release the exam results of the re-takers ahead of the rest of the nursing examinees. Because of the volume of examinees this June, the PRC has given itself at least a month more than the usual target release-date for the nursing e...

The proposed immigration reform bill is essentially dead, at least for now. Last Thursday's 46-53 vote in the U.S. Senate sent the bill back to the shelves to be re-opened probably not until its biggest supporter, President George Bush, leaves his office next year after the US Presidential elections. Meanwhile, the American Immigration Lawyers Association, announced that the US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) may revise the July visa bulletin and change the status for employment-based visa preferences. The Hammond Law Group, which is a member of the organization, says the government agency might retrogress most if not all of the employment-based visa categories with the revision.

BBC reports that Wednesday's vote to continue and not limit debates on immigration reform could mean the end of the line for the controversial bill. Even President George Bush couldn't convince fellow Republicans who voted against finalizing the bill, according to the Washington Post. The Associated Press observed that all the presidential candidates from the Democratic party voted to limit the debate and push the bill forward. In the Republican cast of presidentiables, only Sen. John McCain of Arizona voted to keep the measure alive. Sen. Sam Brownback initially hinted to vote in favor of advancing the bill, but switched his vote at the least minute when he saw the bill was already going down.

U.S. senators on Tuesday voted 64-35 to revive the immigration reform bill, that would grant legal status to 12 million illegal immigrants in the country. Several amendments to the bill are scheduled to be discussed and voted on this week by senators, who early this month thumbed down the bill. President George Bush mustered all his influence just to convince legislators to get the bill back for debates. Bush wants immigration reform to be his legacy as he steps down from office next year. A final vote is set on Friday before Congress takes a break for the July 4 holiday.

A common question we encounter is about the processing of the fingerprinting requirement for nursing licensure in the U.S. Different states have their own security check requirements but common to all of them is fingerprinting. To learn about the specific security requirements in the state where you're applying for a license, just go to that state's Board of Nursing Web site. You can get a list of links and contact information of each state BON from the NCSBN Web site or you can simply google "(state) board of nursing" and you'll find the appropriate link. There are three ways to get hold of the fingerprint cards: 1) You can ask a relative in the U.S. to go to the BON office; 2)You can go to the local U.S. Embassy and request for the card; 3)And last, you can write the BON to send you the fingerprint cards. Usually you'll find instructions on how to request for the fingerprint card on the registration application packet. In California, for example, you can re...

There's a story that appears in the Enquirer today about a hospital in Cincinnati that treats wounded American soldiers from Iraq and Afghanistan. What is interesting about this clinic for wounded soldiers, being run by the Cincinnati VA Medical Center, is that all the staff members have either worked in a military hospital in the past or have relatives in the military. What's more interesting for us Filipinos is that one of the featured nurses in the story is a Filipina nurse who used to serve as an Army nurse here in the country and she's obviously well-loved both by her co-workers and patients. Based on the article, Emma Bunag-Boehm is regarded by her co-workers as the clinic's "house mother". Even if I haven't met here, I know exactly what that's like. In the Philippines, there's always a nanay-nanayan (pseudo moms) anywhere we go, regardless if we're in our place of work, in school dorms, at church, or just about anywhere. You put Filipi...