Is it possible for a foreigner to become a Paramedic in Japan?

[Infection_]

I am planning on training to be a Paramedic in the UK, and I am thinking about doing a degree in Paramedic Science, which would qualify me to be a Paramedic in the UK while at the same time would get me a degree as well.

Firstly, how does the ambulance service work in Japan? Is it state-owned like the UK, or are Paramedic services provided by private companies like the US?

Also, would UK Paramedic training be valid in Japan, or would I have to completely retrain as if I'd never done any Paramedic training?

What would the situation be in regards to getting a work permit? Relistically, assuming I were able to speak Japanese to a proficient level, would I be able to find an ambulance service willing to sponsor a foreigner for a work permit, or is it going to be very near impossible?

Similarly, do Paramedics in Japan have to be Japanese citizens, or is this not a requirement?

Also, what are Paramedic wages like in Japan? In the UK a Paramedic with a few years of experience can expect ￡25,000 - ￡30,000 ($40,000 - $47,000) a year. Are salaries similar in Japan or less?

I'd be interested if anyone could shed some light on this area of work in Japan.

[Mike Cash]

Just to be blunt....you can forget about it; it isn't going to happen.

Ambulance services are the exclusive province of the various local fire departments and the ambulances are staffed by fire department personnel. That requires citizenship in most localities (but not all). Competition for employment is fierce; from what I have been able to find, there are anywhere from 30 to 80 applicants for each opening. Your chances of being the one are so close to zero it isn't worth calculating the difference. The notion that some local fire department, with no shortage of eager local applicants beating down their door, would go to all the trouble to attempt to sponsor you for a visa and go through all that hassle is nonsense. Working visas are typically issued to foreign labor to fill positions that uniquely require some aspect of the person's foreign origins (language ability, etc) or that can't reasonably be filled by local talent....neither of which apply, so a visa is unlikely to begin with.

More to the point, though is your "Realistically, assuming I were able to speak Japanese to a proficient level" bit. Let us get our heads out of Lala-land and admit what an UNrealistic assumption this is. You first started looking into stuff like this five years ago. Tell us: How much has your Japanese ability progressed in the last five years? Have you done any study at all? Have you achieved any proficiency? If you were the least bit serious or credible in your goals and doing the sort of diligent study that would be required to achieve it, by now you would be able to do your own searching for answers on this topic on Japanese webpages and contact potential employers in Japanese yourself. If you haven't done it in the last five years, the idea that you're going to do it in the next five years....or ten years...or twenty years....is just self-delusional. What the heck is the source of your fascination with the notion of coming to Japan and entering upon some profession that you know damned well you haven't the slightest chance of getting into?

You've never even visited this place. What on earth makes you think you want to live here? You don't even know if you're the sort who could adapt to long-term living here without going nuts anyway, much less embark upon a career as a public official here, of all things. Do you realize that most foreigners who come here leave after ONE year? A few stay two, and a very very few stay for three. And that is foreigners who are in jobs that don't even require them to learn the language, assimilate, or really do anything much more demanding than engage in idle chitchat with bored housewives, by and large.

No, you're never going to be a Japanese policeman. You're never going to be a Japanese fireman. You're never going to be a Japanese paramedic. You're not even training to be a British paramedic....you're just "planning" on it. Is whether you go through with actually doing the training dependent upon whether or not you can use that training to become a Japanese paramedic? Is this something you're actually seriously really going to do? Or just more of your fantasy land make-believe?

[Glenski]

Issues and Solutions in Introducing Western Systems to the Pre-hospital Care System in Japan
Good article for you to read (in English, even!). Took me about 12 seconds to search for it.

"In Japan, most paramedics have a firefighter background. The paramedic job requirements include a minimum of five years of employment as ambulance personnel, approximately 509 hours of lecture, and 406 hours of hospital training or simulation in a designated training facility. This represents a total of approximately 915 hours of training; however, on-the-job training with currently certified paramedics is not required.15 In addition, there is no system for relicensing or renewal in Japan, and continuing education is up to each individual."

"Another difference between the U.S. and Japanese paramedic profession is that most Japanese paramedics belong to the department as public civil servants and only a minority work as paramedics for private entities."

I also found this article interesting. Almost none of the Japanese paramedics in this study had any training in the simple act of lifting.
http://pdm.medicine.wisc.edu/Volume_...ue_2/okada.pdf

Other related material.
http://www.med.or.jp/english/journal...01/010_015.pdf
Japan's paramedics in a straitjacket | The Japan Times Online
http://members2.jcom.home.ne.jp/nishikawaw/tenbo.pdf
一般社団法人日本救急救命士協会

Perhaps (a big perhaps!) you could see what the U.S. military bases offer.

[KirinMan]

What would the situation be in regards to getting a work permit? Relistically, assuming I were able to speak Japanese to a proficient level, would I be able to find an ambulance service willing to sponsor a foreigner for a work permit, or is it going to be very near impossible?

Let's assume you can speak Japanese, you seem to be over-looking one thing, you would absolutely need to be able to READ and WRITE Japanese fluently as well. Not romaji, Japanese. If you can't do that you might as well look for some other type of work.

[Infection_]

Just to be blunt....you can forget about it; it isn't going to happen.

Ambulance services are the exclusive province of the various local fire departments and the ambulances are staffed by fire department personnel. That requires citizenship in most localities (but not all). Competition for employment is fierce; from what I have been able to find, there are anywhere from 30 to 80 applicants for each opening. Your chances of being the one are so close to zero it isn't worth calculating the difference. The notion that some local fire department, with no shortage of eager local applicants beating down their door, would go to all the trouble to attempt to sponsor you for a visa and go through all that hassle is nonsense. Working visas are typically issued to foreign labor to fill positions that uniquely require some aspect of the person's foreign origins (language ability, etc) or that can't reasonably be filled by local talent....neither of which apply, so a visa is unlikely to begin with.

That's the bit I find strange. Japan allegedly has a labour shortage, yet still make it very nearly impossible for a foreigner to find employment in a job that isn't directly related to the fact they are foreign.

Why exactly do most foreigners leave after one year? Is it the fact many find it hard to adjust to living there, or rather is it the fact that they can't find any work or can't secure a visa so are forced to leave?

Unfortunately, I believe that it is going to be Japan's reluctance to open up to foreign workers that is going to drive the country into the ground. When a country has a declining population a certain amount of foreign workers need to be admitted each year to compensate for that. It's tried and tested solid economic theory.

Basically, it seems Japan doesn't really want foreigners in their country at all and they make it as difficult as possible for foreigners to secure long-term employment in the country without actually banning foreigners completely.

[KirinMan]

Basically, it seems Japan doesn't really want foreigners in their country at all and they make it as difficult as possible for foreigners to secure long-term employment in the country without actually banning foreigners completely.

You have been told this before and yet you continue to ignore it, Japan while not having the most "open" immigration and work policies for foreigners has over 2 million foreigners working and living here LONG TERM now. Stop pointing fingers just because you don't like it. If you truly want it, you will do what is necessary and adapt to it.

Take this as you will, Japan is NOT a country that is going to change to fit your needs, if you came here to live and work you would understand what I am talking about. You either adapt to things here or end up frustrated because things to change to your way of thinking, or your balloon gets popped because it isn't the romantic fantasy land that you may have created for yourself about the country. That's one reason why so many leave after a short time. It wasn't what they expected and they were too stubborn to try to adjust and adapt to reality.


I can not understand your stubbornness in not accepting the fact that the country here expects people coming here to work to be able to communicate in Japanese. Meaning reading and writing as well.


What is so difficult about understanding that? You can not expect any country to change their ways just to satisfy your desire, dreams, fantasies?, of going to live and or work there.

[Glenski]

Why exactly do most foreigners leave after one year? Is it the fact many find it hard to adjust to living there, or rather is it the fact that they can't find any work or can't secure a visa so are forced to leave?

The visa itself is not the problem, IMO. It is simply the fact that for most non-teaching jobs, people need to satisfy employers' requirements of having a certain competency in the language.

For the teachers who migrate in and out in 2-3 years, they just feel they've had their share of fun and the "Japan experience". There really aren't that many who are seriously into TEFL for the long haul and who want to stay in Japan for it. Here, too, they will run into a ceiling which stops them from getting higher salaries unless they are willing to raise their credentials. Most don't.

[Infection_]

The visa itself is not the problem, IMO. It is simply the fact that for most non-teaching jobs, people need to satisfy employers' requirements of having a certain competency in the language.

For the teachers who migrate in and out in 2-3 years, they just feel they've had their share of fun and the "Japan experience". There really aren't that many who are seriously into TEFL for the long haul and who want to stay in Japan for it. Here, too, they will run into a ceiling which stops them from getting higher salaries unless they are willing to raise their credentials. Most don't.

I guess the biggest thing that foreigners fall short on is language requirements in order to function in a role aimed at Japanese workers?

However, in general do foreign qualifications cross-over in Japan to any extent, or for the purpose of recruitment are foreign candidates expected to have Japanese qualifications?

[Mike Cash]

Foreign candidates are recruited for some aspect of their foreignness, as a general rule. They're brought in to fulfill some role that can't be filled by Japanese candidates. Naturally, there is no expectation that they would be in possession of Japanese qualifications. If Japanese qualifications are what is required, the job is filled by a Japanese candidate, though depending on the circumstances it may be someone with knowledge or experience of the field/industry outside Japan.

I can't seem to successfully hammer into your head that Japan is not a country which just lets folks in just because they want in. The conditions of their being allowed in to work are that they have to fulfill some role/function that can't just as well be fulfilled by a Japanese person. People on spouse visas or who have acquired permanent residency, for example, are freed up from that and with few exceptions are free to try for any sort of work they can convince an employer to hire them for. For example: I came here in the US Navy, got married, went on a spouse visa, acquired permanent resident status, and for quite a long time I have been a truck driver here. There is no way in hell that a Japanese company would recruit drivers from outside Japan. It isn't necessary. I do nothing that has anything to do with my foreign origins. English plays zero role in my work. There is nothing about my work that can't be performed perfectly well by Japanese people and there is no way they could get visas for people even if they wanted them...and why on earth would they?

Few if any Western foreigners would tolerate the same working hours, pay, and conditions as their Japanese counterparts, which is why even if you find the ones who are otherwise eligible (spouse visa, permanent resident) to try for regular jobs here you won't find any of them actually doing it, with a very few exceptions, perhaps. They fully expect better hours, better pay, and better conditions. And they want a pass on having to learn to function in Japanese....especially literacy. As I said in another of your threads, the foreign population self-ghettoizes when it comes to employment as a general thing, and almost universally so in the case of those from first-world countries.

Want to know why I could get hired to do what I do? I'm licensed in Japan, didn't neglect learning how to read Japanese, and I put up with working 14+ hours a day six days a week for crap wages....just like all the Japanese drivers I work with. This is why I find your unfounded assertions of rampant Japanese discrimination in hiring to be so laughable; I know firsthand that while discrimination does take place, it is by no means as universal as you imagine it to be. I have my job even though I am a foreigner....not just because I am a foreigner. There is zero benefit to my company in having a foreigner doing my job. I have the job because I can perform it the same as all the Japanese people I work with, which in my company is everybody except me.

If you want to get some job in Japan other than the run-of-the-mill standard stuff that foreigners can get visas to do, first you're going to have to qualify for one of those run-of-the-mill foreigner jobs, get a visa for it, hang out here long enough to acquire either a spouse visa or permanent residency, and then do it. You're not going to get to come to Japan just because you want to and be a cop, or a paramedic, or even something as low-end and mundane as what I do just because you think it would be a lark to do it. Japanese immigration policy, oddly enough, is designed to serve the needs of the Japanese nation and not the whims of everybody else on the planet. Go figure.

[Glenski]

Infection,
If you mean by "qualifications" something like licenses, then foreigners will have to get them in Japan following Japanese rules and laws. If you mean something else, you'll have to be more specific.

For example, to say that a Japanese university will hire a professor is one thing, but if the candidate is a professor ranking from a country where the qualifications to attain that rank are below Japanese standards, then it's obvious they won't be considered strongly or at all. Heck, even within Japan, to say you are a certain uni rank at a public/private/national uni and try to get a job in a different one will not always work!

Go to www.daijob.com and run a search for various job categories. Language requirements for non-teaching jobs are invariably "native level" or "fluent", or at the lowest JLPT2 (an older classification that obviously some people have not caught onto yet). As for the required "qualifications", you'll have to do the research yourself. Expect to read most of the ads in Japanese, though.

[nice gaijin]

イギリスで普通のイギリス人のように働きたいです。イギリスに行ったことがないけど、イギリスに住みたいと 思います。英語全く分からないけど、いつか勉強するつもりです。研修を全く受けていないけど、いつか受ける つもりです。もし日本で研修うけたり、英語習ったりして、簡単にイギリスに引っ越して雇われるわけではあり ませんか。なんでもかんでもイギリスに行きたいです。その夢を叶うために努力する予定だけです けど。

これは僕の夢です。批判は許しません。

[Davey]

Found this article:

Only 3 foreign nurses pass Japan exam

MANY developed countries depend on hundreds, if not thousands, of foreigners to overcome severe nursing-staff shortages.

But in Japan, two Indonesians and one Filipina have become the first foreign nurses to pass the country's national nursing qualification test. They did so after gaining work experience at Japanese hospitals under economic partnership agreements.

The trio are among 370 foreign nurses who entered the country under a project launched in fiscal 2008, hoping to pass the nursing exam after receiving Japanese-language training and gaining work experience under the supervision of Japanese nurses.

The rest have all failed the test. Last year, 82 foreign nurses took the exam. None passed. This year, 254 such nurses took the test, with only those three candidates passing, reported the Health, Labour and Welfare Ministry.

Critically, foreign nurses wishing to gain qualifications in Japan are required to take the same exam as Japanese applicants.

This year, about 90 per cent of Japanese applicants passed the test. This figure stood at only 1.2 per cent for foreign nurses.

Foreign nurses take six months of language training after arriving in Japan. Even so, nurses at Japanese hospitals that host them, as well as volunteers who aid them, have complained that they have been left to teach the foreign nurses the practical Japanese that is actually needed for their work at medical institutions.

read the whole article

[FrustratedDave]

イギリスで普通のイギリス人のように働きたいです。イギリスに行ったことがないけど、イギリスに住みたいと 思います。英語全く分からないけど、いつか勉強するつもりです。研修を全く受けていないけど、いつか受ける つもりです。もし日本で研修うけたり、英語習ったりして、簡単にイギリスに引っ越して雇われるわけではあり ませんか。なんでもかんでもイギリスに行きたいです。その夢を叶うために努力する予定だけです けど。

これは僕の夢です。批判は許しません。

Go for it! Looks like you have a great chance!!!!