Moving to japan as a nurse

4 comments

1. This is a copy of your post for archive/search purposes.

   —

   **Moving to japan as a nurse**

   Hello, I’m currently studying nurse in the UK at one of the top 100 universities in the world, i have two years till I finish university and get my degree and more 2-3 years until I’m actually free seek moving to japan. I decided to start learning Japanese this year and hopefully by the time I finish uni I’ll be in a good place with the language.

   I knew becoming a nurse in Japan is hard, but what should i do to achieve it? I’m not against picking up another job that is related to nursing (like university professor or academic in general in nursing major, or medical sales since that is something that got my interest lately) but I want to know what to keep my eye on in the next couple of years that could help me with moving.

   I hope you guys help me and if anyone how has a medical background I would love it if you could share your experience in moving to japan

   *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/movingtojapan) if you have any questions or concerns.*

2. Can you be a nurse in Japan?

   Yes, but it is very unlikely because of the high level of Japanese you need to pass the nursing licensing.

   Refer our medical wiki and nursing threads about the national licensing exam for RN.

   * https://www.reddit.com/r/movingtojapan/wiki/doctor#wiki_can_i_be_a_doctor_in_japan.3F

   * https://www.reddit.com/r/movingtojapan/comments/ga0cbq/being_a_nurse_in_japan/

   * https://www.reddit.com/r/movingtojapan/comments/j90ke7/its_possible_work_in_japan_as_nurse_even_if_im/

   * https://www.reddit.com/r/movingtojapan/comments/gd4mjo/prospect_of_being_an_american_nurse_in_japan/

   ______
   My opinion: The many year**s** of study of the Japanese language to get to the point you could take the Japanese license exams would be a waste—You could become an MD far easier.

3. > I’m not against picking up another job that is related to nursing (like university professor or academic in general in nursing major, or medical sales since that is something that got my interest lately)

   1) Medical sales will take even higher levels of Japanese than the nursing exams.

   2. University teaching will be restricted to teaching medical English. University teaching will require you to have published papers and at least a master’s degree—It very competitive so you you will need powerful connections here to be considered.

4. Sorry, but no. You’re just starting japanese and you’re going to be nowhere near proficient enough in 2-3 years even if you already lived in Japan and spoke only japanese from here on out, and you don’t. You’re trying to learn in the UK while studying nursing in English. You might become conversational in that time but you will also know none of the necessary vocabulary for nursing in Japan. Not to mention will need to be able to read japanese as well, and you really can’t make mistakes there. If you misread a label or chart there can be deadly consequences here.

   >like university professor or academic in general in nursing major, or medical sales since that is something that got my interest lately

   If these the only reasonable one is medical sales, but again you won’t have enough japanese. University professor isn’t happening right out of school in the UK and definitely isn’t happening in Japan without near native levels of the language.

   Basically here’s how you could possibly make this work.
   1) get job in Japan (likely as English teacher)
   2) spend the next 3-5 years in Japan using nothing but japanese making sure to read as many medical texts in japanese as you can to properly learn the kanji and terminology in japanese.
   3) somehow pass japanese nursing tests.
   4) successfully interview and obtain job.

   Short answer, not going to happen. Long answer, you’re going to have to live here for several years (most likely a decade) to get even the chance, and that’s not even counting anti-gaijin bias.