US Immigration for nurses

Question: We have many questions from nurses asking, what is the visa bulletin? Can you explain that it's very confusing. And also, can you tell us about the latest visa bulletin.

Atty. Sang Shin: I think one of my colleagues in the past described it as kind of your ticket in the deli line. And you know, right now, the US immigration laws only allow a certain number of, you know, individuals per country each year into the United States for green card and immigrant visa purposes.

And the way they break it down is based upon your preference category, sir. So for example, employment base, yep, preference category One, two, and three. So many times our registered nurses are going to fall under EB3. And then they also look at the various countries around the world. So this is the latest October 2022 bulletin. And you have it says row, which means the country so you have the Philippines, India, China, some of the countries where there are the most foreign nationals that are entering the United States. And then you have everybody else, right.

So you know, the Philippines, for example, a high area where we see a lot of nurses, you see a lot of you know, backlog sometimes in certain categories. But for October, you'll see here on this chart that the Philippines is current. And then you have let's say, India and China that have dates that are tied to it, and how and how I can explain that is that whenever we file or whenever a immigrant visa is filed for you, on your behalf, you receive what they call a priority date.

And so Tanya, if you just go back to that chart for a second, that priority date, for example, in China or India, let's say it says April 1 2012. And how you read that is if you have a priority date that was on or before April 1 2012. In India, for example, then you may apply for an immigrant visa or green card. Luckily for nurses in the Philippines. That is its current right now. Which means that there's no wait time, so to speak, from filing a immigrant visa petition, and then ultimately getting scheduled for an appointment in at the US embassy in the Philippines. And when I say no wait time, I mean, no way time in terms of filing.

But I'm sure that we'll explore a little bit more on this call there. There still are some associated wait times, but not for filing for the actual visa.

Okay, thank you. Thanks. So that gives us a very clear explanation of the visa bulletin. And the good news is that, except for India, and China, all other countries are current right now, which means if you are watching this show, for the first time you're thinking about coming to United States, this is the time to do it. The visa bulletin is current, which means that we can file for you. And we need you to pass your NCLEX exam if you are a registered nurse.

 

How is the visa bulletin going for Filipino-born applicants for 2023? What are your comments on what you think is going to happen in the coming year?

Maria was mentioning this earlier, there are kind of these unofficial official individuals that always comment on what's going to happen in the upcoming year as a practitioner, I read about those things. But I actually don't pay attention to them too much because, you know, for Filipinos, Filipino nurses and EB3, it's current in October, right. And it's been current, I believe, for quite some time. So I think that we go month to month, we check when it comes out. And in my point of view, the forecast looks good for it to continue to stay current. But I mean, like I said like there are some ways to kind of see what those might be. But there's nothing official that ever comes out until it's posted. Right and so my forecast is very optimistic always and I think we're would be good for 2023.

Okay, good. Well, we hope you're right saying as we know, there's no, there's no way to tell 100%. But the one thing that we do know for sure, and that is that it's current right now. So if you are watching this, if you have not yet passed your NCLEX exam, if you are a registered nurse and you want to come to the United States, now is the time to apply for your NCLEX. Now is the time to apply to Connetics USA and we'd be happy to find you, a petitioner, we have sponsors all over the United States, if you have a sustained California, a brother in New York, a friend in Florida and a relative in Texas, we were saying is if you want to go to Ohio, wherever it is that you want to go, we have positions. So now is the time because we know right now it is current.