Mohammad Taghi Jahanpour, the head of the Iranian Nursing Organization, stated that from March 21 to December 21, 2023, 216 nurses have resigned due to the difficulty of the job and low wages.
Hussein Qana’ati, the president of Tehran University of Medical Sciences, also mentioned that neighboring Gulf and European countries are recruiting Iranian nurses, describing it as being as common as “drinking a glass of water.”
Jahanpour, on February 24, informed the state-run Mehr news agency that the majority of nurse resignations in the past nine months were concentrated in Tehran, where the highest number of the country’s hospitals is located.
He pointed out that the very low retention rate of nurses in the capital has led to a chaotic situation, with nurses leaving their jobs and migrating from government hospitals in Tehran.
According to Jahanpour, when a nurse leaves a department, an additional 200 hours of overtime are imposed on their colleagues.
However, nurses in other departments are not willing to work overtime. In late June 2023, the semiofficial ILNA news agency reported on mandatory overtime for nurses and emphasized that, due to staff shortages, a nurse who completes their scheduled shift often has to work an additional shift. Nevertheless, the hourly wage for overtime is only 160,000 to 200,000 rials (approximately $0.27-0.34).
The report highlighted that, based on productivity laws, a nurse is obligated to work approximately 150 hours per month, and overtime should not be mandatory. If a nurse does not want to work overtime, they should still receive their full salary by completing their scheduled hours.
However, as per the nurses’ statements, in many healthcare centers, this overtime is mandatory.
According to the report, the monthly salary of a nurse ranges from 100 to 120 million rials (approximately $174-208), but for mandatory overtime, considered a separate shift, they are paid only between 10 to 20 million rials (approximately $17.3-34.7).
In mid-November 2023, Mohammad Sharifi Moghadam, the Secretary-General of the Nurses’ House, reported patient deaths in Iranian hospitals due to a severe shortage of nurses. He declared that more than 3,000 nurses migrate from Iran annually. However, the Ministry of Health does not even add this number to the healthcare workforce.
Previously, in official statistics, it was announced that over 90% of nurses are dissatisfied with their jobs, with less than 10% being nurses who do not engage in clinical work.
The shortage of nurses in Iran, especially since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, has worsened, leading nurses to protest against their working conditions in various cities.
Professional associations in recent years have repeatedly pointed out a shortage of at least 100,000 nurses in Iranian hospitals.
