SKILLED WORKER IMMIGRATION IN CANADA: INTERNATIONALLY TRAINED DENTIST POINT OF VIEW
Immigrating to Canada and getting a permanent residency is a dream come true for everyone. But more it looks great when you see it from your home country; more you find it like a nightmare when you land in the country. And I am talking in relation to internationally trained dentists, doctors, physicians, and other health care workers and specialists. There are tonnes of problems that I want to make everyone aware of before moving to Canada:
When you are selected as a skilled worker in express entry, your education, work experience, and other skills are being evaluated. But when you enter the country, whatever degree, the experience you have, it becomes zero. You see darkness ahead and lots of roadblocks are there to get to the goals. This is the most demotivating and depressing factor of the immigration system.
The living cost in Ontario is so high that if you have savings that would not be enough to survive for long. In short, a family of 3 -4 people needs a minimum of 3000$ to 4000$ per month to survive and live a good life. Obviously, you need a job, but if you are from the medical field like a dental, physician; there are not many opportunities available. You have to opt for survival jobs basically general labor jobs.
The general labor and other survival jobs are very physically and mentally demanding. That is for sure that a professional person in mid 30 s who had a white-collar job back in the home country would be able to handle the pressure from these kinds of jobs.
Now, the only option left is to get the license in the same profession as the person belongs. But that process is tedious and requires lots of studying, time, and money. If you want to study, you won't be able to work or if want to work, you won't be able to study. If you chose to study then who would feed your family? The government is not taking care of any of the trouble you are going through. The government is just making immigration laws without addressing the problems in the broken system.
The next is mental stress one goes through during all these years which may lead to depression, agony, health issues, divorces, and neglected children. The government is not working on the root cause of the problems but opening mental wellness centers and hotlines. It is like writing cigarette smoking is injurious to health on the cigarette packs itself and selling it. It has been observed that there is no work-life balance in regular jobs. Moreover, you are paid per day basis and weekly and biweekly which does not consider any emergency problems you might have so if you are absent you lose money.
A simple example of hypocrisy is that when you arrive as a new immigrant in Canada, you cannot drive a car (if you can afford it) for at least 1-2 years. It involves three exams theory, city driving, and highway driving tests. The car is a basic need of a family, in case of any emergency you would need it. And it is not that there are no accidents after passing all those exams, the accidents are done by the same people who got the license. My point is that if the government made getting the license of the car so difficult which is a very basic need then how to expect from the same government to ease the licensing procedure for internationally trained professionals. The good thing about a driving license is, though you can present your previous driving record from your home country, and the time frame is reduced but it is not the case in getting a license for medical professionals.
The psychological problem with government people is that they don't know the difference between the different categories of skilled workers. The IT people can get jobs in their field with their previous experience but it is not so with medical professionals, it involves stringent steps to reach to the destination. Actually government needs lots of people who can construct houses and do other labor jobs, but they cannot expect labor speaking English and passing IELTS. They should face the reality and bring actual labor from other countries who could work what is actually needed. The government expects that educated people will come and students will cover their labor needs but that does not work long term. That's why their real estate market is becoming unaffordable as they are unable to meet demand and supply.
Some of the steps of the license exams are totally unnecessary and can be avoided to save time for professional licensing. One of the examples, after surveying from the foreign-trained dentists, is there are two theory exams for them followed by one practical exam and then one licensing exam. Therefore they have to pass the four exams to get their license and also if they pass in one attempt, they would be able to reach the end of the dark tunnel after 2 years. By chance which is quite possible because to pass, the percentage is so high that people fail in one or two exams in between balancing the work-family-studies. Sometimes. people lose hope and that dark tunnel leads back them to their home countries after so many sufferings. It is obvious that all the steps are for minting money from foreign-trained professionals. They are ready to give money but want to reduce the time period to become licensed. For your knowledge they give practical exams on dummies and not on real patients, so here is the real hippocracy that the regulatory bodies still believe on their past experiences for real patient management.
Another issue is that anybody can take the exam for dental licensing, there is no demarcation between the pr, citizen, or you are on a visitor visa because the more people will register, the more money they (regulatory bodies) can make.
The universities also do not accept foreign-trained dentists easily and some of the universities have separated from the national board exam like the University of Toronto. Now you have to sit for separate exam to enter those universities and it involves a totally separate procedure to be followed.
If the regulatory bodies and government don't look into the matter, it is not far in the future that the medical and dental health systems are going to crash in the near future.