Dear Readers:
Nearly a week has passed since we rolled out our new web site and the compliments have been pouring in. We appreciate all of your kind words, which are particularly refreshing after working the better part of a year on the project.
Last week I delivered a talk to the Nashville Healthcare Council on, among other things, the procedures for sponsoring international physicians for visas. The picture I gave was a mixture of excellent news and dismal news. On the excellent side, there is a good chance that in the next few weeks, Congress may pass a bill to increase the number of State sponsored waivers from 20 to 30. Also, we have been working closely with a federal agency that is nearly ready to roll out a new federal physician waiver program (can’t say much more than that yet, but we’ll have some news for everyone soon).
On the negative side, physician cases are being held up in a number of places. Cases filed more than a year ago with the US Department of Agriculture are still pending. Once approved, the INS then needs to actually issue H-1B approvals. The INS appears to have reversed its longstanding practice of allowing for H-1B applications to be filed once the State Department issues a waiver recommendation and before the INS formally approves an I-612 waiver. Now the INS is demanding that the I-612 waiver be approved and this delays cases by months longer. Then the doctor must go abroad to pick up the visa and has to often wait one to two months for a security check by the Department of State. By the time the waiver is approved, the doctor would have been very close to satisfying the two year home residency requirement anyway if he or she had just gone home.
Add to that a study just released by the American College of International Physicians showing that the number of foreign medical graduates applying for visas is plummeting. In 1995, more than 35,000 doctors took the necessary exams to come to the US to work in residency programs. In 2001, just over 15,000 took the necessary exams. Much of this drop is due to the new Clinical Skills Assessment exam, which doctors need to pass to come on a J-1 visa. Many doctors simply cannot afford the $1200 price tag. And I have received numerous emails from doctors around the world who have been denied visas to come over here to take the exam (which is only offered in the US).
Fewer J-1 waivers and fewer doctors even coming to the US to work as residents on J-1 visas will spell disaster for medically underserved areas throughout the US who depend on foreign doctors to provide critical health care to millions of Americans. The ECFMG argues that the CSA exam screens physicians better and health care in the US is improved. The INS and State Department and USDA will argue that all of the delays are in the name of quality assurance and protecting security. But tell that to the people who have no doctor at all because of these policies. Are they better off having no health care at all?
On a more positive note, I wanted to wish our Jewish readers a happy and healthy L’Shana Tova (good new year).
Finally, as always, we remind readers that we’re lawyers who make our living representing immigration clients. We would love to discuss becoming your law firm. Just go to http://visalaw.wpengine.com/intake.html to request an appointment or call us at 800-748-3819 or 901-682-6455.
Kind regards,
Greg Siskind
Disclaimer: This newsletter is provided as a public service and not intended to establish an attorney client relationship. Any reliance on information contained herein is taken at your own risk. The information provided in this article has not been updated since its original posting and you should not rely on it until you consult counsel to determine if the content is still valid. We keep older articles online because it helps in the understanding of the development of immigration law.