Coping with homesickness among Filipino nurses working in England

Abstract

The high possibility of Filipino nurses working abroad and eventually migrating permanently has always been an accepted reality in the profession. This is in fact one of the reasons for the attraction of the course. Most parents would struggle to put through Nursing School one of their children with a view that all their sacrifices would pay off once their child finishes nursing school, work abroad and send money home to help put the rest of their siblings through College as well. This is because the main problem plaguing the Filipino family is financial insufficiency. According to Hunt et al (1987), economic instability may be the most pressing problem of the Filipino family today. Unemployment and underemployment are two factors that have affected family income. To solve this problem, some Filipinos have taken jobs overseas. Overseas workers remit their earnings to the family in the hope that it will improve the family social and economic status.

In the last few years, the United Kingdom, which started hiring Filipinos on 1999, has become attractive to Filipino nurses because of the high rate of pay.

With the nurses leaving their families behind, they may feel homesick. Homesickness is universal. It can strike any of us when we have moved to new surroundings and are being called upon to meet our needs in a different way and with different people. Each of us has a different tolerance for change and learn different methods of coping with unfamiliar surroundings.

This study was conducted in order to determine the methods of coping with homesickness among Filipino nurses working in England. Among the questions the study attempted to address are: what coping methods do the nurses use when they feel homesick, what factors influence the coping method and does personality influence the type of coping method that they use?

The study, as a descriptive research, made use of the survey method in the form of a structured questionnaire utilizing a checklist of coping methods that has been adapted and categorized based on Lazarus’s Ways of Coping Checklist. Follow-up in-depth interviews were also conducted to provide a more thorough and reliable understanding of the coping of individual nurses.

Findings of the study revealed that age, sex, marital status and educational background are significantly associated with the type of coping method used. There is also some association between length of stay in England, previous work experience and presence of the family in England and the coping methods of nurses. Personality type has also been found to greatly influence the choice of the coping method used.

It was concluded that nurses generally favor active coping methods as they mainly use Seeking Social Support with homesickness. They also use Planning and Hoping as a coping method.

As active methods of coping are generally viewed to be “healthier” than suppressive techniques, it was further concluded that Filipino nurses appear to cope with the stress of homesickness quite well.