AIREDALE Hospital bosses are offering English lessons to foreign nurses who need to improve their language skills for working on the wards.

The tailor-made classes and one-to-one sessions are being offered to all new nursing and midwifery staff from Europe and further afield who need it, said the trust’s director of nursing, Rob Dearden.

New rules came into force this month meaning all nurses and midwives from Europe will have to prove their English is good enough to work in the UK.

If they have not trained or worked in an English-speaking country before they will now have to pass a language assessment first. Those rules already stood for job candidates outside the EU.

Recruitment chiefs at Airedale, who have just taken on 27 nurses from Croatia and Romania taking its number of foreign staff to 92, already tests potential new starters before any jobs are offered.

With the help of international recruitment experts, all of Airedale’s foreign job candidates are put through, and have to pass, a written and spoken English test before getting shortlisted for any work. If successful they have a 20-minute telephone interview before coming face-to-face with a panel.

Nursing Midwifery Council chief executive Jackie Smith said the ability to communicate effectively with patients was fundamental to patient safety and a principle that was central to the council's code.

"We can now investigate patient safety concerns in relation to a nurse or midwife’s ability to communicate effectively in English," she added.

"Along with the new EU alerts mechanism, which will make it easier to share any fitness to practise information with other EU member states, this will greatly improve patient safety."

Last month, a study found patients treated by nurses educated abroad were less likely to feel confident in the care they receive and report less satisfaction.

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