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Canadians adapting well to U.S. nursing exam, testmaker insists

Controversy has surrounded the adoption of the U.S. nurse licensing exam, titled the NCLEX (National Council Licensure Examination) in Canada. The U.S. test replaced the Canadian Registered Nurse Examination January 5 as Canada's test for those applying to be a registered nurse. Reports such as a September 18 article in the Toronto Sun quoted Canadian exam takers who claimed the test contained American terms unfamiliar to Canadian medicine, such as job titles and medications. Linda Haslam-Stroud, president of the Ontario Nurses Association, said there are job titles and medications in the exam that are not in use in Ontario or Canada, as reported in the May/June 2015 Professional Licensing Report. Phil Dickison, chief officer of examinations at the National Council of State Boards of Nursing, strongly disagrees with these claims. In an interview with PLR, Dickison asserted that any initial decrease in pass rates was due to the test’s new format, not because it isn’t “Canadianized.”

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