Study on the return to international cooperation by nursing personnel: Reasons for wanting to participate in international cooperation again by Japan overseas cooperation volunteers after returning to Japan and obstacles to it

Abstract

Background and Aims: Although 80-90% of those who participate in Japan Overseas Cooperation Volunteers wish to participate again, a series of studies related to their return after coming back to Japan has not progressed very far. Accordingly, our objective in this study was to elucidate issues related to the nursing profession. Methods: The subjects were 397 members of the nursing personnel who had returned from service in the Overseas Cooperation Volunteers. We divided the answers received to a mail-type questionnaire on "desire to participate again", "reasons for desiring to participate again", and "obstacles" into meaningful sentences and coded them. We then categorized them according to codes that were similar and analyzed them. Results: Many of the subjects wanted to participate again (289, 72.8%), but only 14 (3.5%) reported the absence of any obstacles. The reasons for wanting to participate again and the obstacles were as follows. 1. The most common reason was self-fulfillment. 2. "Specialty" and "language study" were cited as both reasons and obstacles. 3. Obstacles consisted of personal issues: "family" and "self". Conclusions: Nurses wanted to participate again the same as members of other occupations, but the number of return participants is small, and characteristics of largely female occupations, i.e., personal issues such as "family" and "health", emerged as obstacles.