Hire the clinician. Keep the clinician.
We recruit experienced clinicians from overseas into permanent roles in New Zealand and Australia, and coordinate the registration and the move.
Recruiting in New Zealand since 2023, and recently expanded into Australia, starting with medical imaging. A small, deliberate number of placements lets one person stay accountable for each move, from first call to first year.
International healthcare recruitment with long-term retention in mind.
Finding experienced healthcare professionals is challenging, particularly when vacancies have been difficult to fill locally.
At Ethicare, we work with healthcare employers across Australia and New Zealand to identify suitably qualified international candidates who are committed to relocating.
We take time to understand your service, team culture and the communities you care for, alongside each candidate’s professional experience and personal circumstances.
That way, we can introduce professionals who have the skills, experience and motivation to build a future with your team.
Can we hire internationally at all?
Often, yes. Whether it will work for a particular role usually comes down to four things.
Registration decides everything after it
Whether the clinician can register with the relevant board sets the visa, the start date and the offer. We check it before anyone’s time is spent.
See the registration checker →The visa follows the pathway
Once the board route is clear, the work visa follows a known process. We sequence it and keep the file moving; the decisions stay with the immigration authority. We coordinate the process; we do not give immigration advice.
A likely timeline
Across the placements we have made, offer to arrival has usually fallen between five and nine months. It varies by profession, by board and by where the clinician is coming from, so we tell you where your role is likely to sit before you commit.
Supervision and accredited posts
Some boards expect a supervised period, or a post that meets an accreditation standard, before a clinician can work unsupervised. Knowing this before you advertise avoids an appointment that cannot start.
Planning & governance →The professions we know well
A defined list, in two countries. If your role sits close to these, ask — you’ll get a straight answer either way.
New Zealand Profession-specific boards
- Sonographers General and cardiac scopes
- Radiographers & medical imaging technologists
- Radiation therapists
- Consultant radiologists
- Physiotherapists
- Occupational therapists
- Psychologists
- Anaesthetic technicians
- General practitioners
Australia Ahpra — or ASAR for sonographers
- Sonographers
- Radiographers
- Radiation therapists
- Consultant radiologists
- Nuclear medicine technologists
Australia is the newer of our two markets, currently medical imaging and radiation therapy.
Want the detail? Read the employer’s international recruitment toolkit →
Who’s out there?
Ask us. We can tell you who we are already talking to in your profession and region, and exactly where each person stands on registration.
How candidates are assessed
- Verified against the board — profession, registration route and stage, so “available” means a date.
- A start date read from the process, not from optimism.
- The regions they would move to, so a shortlist fits the posting.
- The household — a partner’s work, children’s schooling, the questions that decide whether a family settles.
How introductions work
- One named person at a time, with their consent.
- Contact details released only on acceptance.
- Nothing is shared beyond the conversation, and every tool stays free to the clinician, however they got their job.
Tell us the role and the region and we will answer personally.
Ask who we’ve got →Will they stay?
Here is one team we recruited for, and how things stood a year after they arrived.
Three anaesthetic technicians for one perioperative team
A perioperative team at a hospital in Palmerston North had anaesthetic technician vacancies it couldn’t fill locally. Locum cover was keeping the service running, and the pressure was falling on the staff already there.
We recruited three anaesthetic technicians who trained in India and built their experience in leading private hospitals in the Middle East, selecting for clinical skill, shared values and long-term commitment. We coordinated registration and immigration, prepared them through our Kiwi Workplace Readiness Programme before they left, and planned their settlement before they arrived.
The service manager met each new recruit and their family at the airport, accommodation was arranged, and the wider team held a picnic so the families could start building friendships.
All three arrived in August 2025, registered and joined the roster. A year later, all three were still in post, the service had moved from rolling locum cover to a permanent team, and the families had made Palmerston North home.
The full case study →The same year, from the families’ side →
“Sophie always puts candidate care first, and has invested heavily in preparing candidates for a successful move — ensuring they have as much support as possible when relocating to a new country.”
MareeTalent Acquisition Manager, a New Zealand hospital
“We’ve worked with many recruiters over the years, but none have shown the same integrity and attention to detail as Ethicare. Their imaging candidates are always well-prepared, compliant, and ready to make a positive impact from day one.”
BarbaraTalent Acquisition Manager, a New Zealand hospital
Support after arrival
We coordinate the registration, the visa and the move itself, then stay in touch through the first year while people settle in: the bank account, the GP, the school place, the fortnight when a family wonders whether they got it right. For clinicians we place, this is included as standard; for your direct hires, it’s available by arrangement.
Retention & belonging, in the toolkit →This is what our relocation support looks like.
Every candidate we place gets resources made for their move, and where relevant for their family. From the first few weeks to finding a place to belong, the details matter.
“This is incredible and honestly one of the most comprehensive relocation and welcome packs I’ve seen… It’s so good that I’m seriously considering stealing it and using it for all of our new starters! It answers so many of the questions people typically have and covers things we often don’t think to tell them until after they’ve arrived.”
Anonymised extracts from real Ethicare resources. Each candidate’s pack is adapted to their circumstances and destination, so materials vary from one placement to the next.
What happens after you send us a role
A person reads it and replies, usually within a working day, with a clear answer on whether we can help. If it’s a fit, the search runs like this, with one person accountable throughout.
We reply
Within a working day: whether it’s a role we can fill, and a likely timeline. If it isn’t, we’ll say so.
Understand the service
Your team, your constraints, the supervision you can offer and what the role really needs.
Search & qualify
A targeted search, then the conversations that decide whether someone is a candidate.
Registration & move readiness
Where they stand with the board, the visa and the practicalities of moving a household.
Shortlist & offer
A short, relevant shortlist prepared for your process; then offer, registration and visa run in parallel.
After arrival
Settling in, the practical questions of the first months, and a named person for the clinician and their family to call.
Built by someone who has done the workforce planning.
Ethicare was founded by Sophie Careem, previously a Senior Service Improvement and Transformation Manager at the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust — work that was about why services can’t fill roles, what long-term gaps do to teams, and which changes hold.
So we talk about vacancy pressure, supervision capacity and team stability. You deal directly with the people who know the candidates.
International recruitment works best when it’s treated as workforce planning, with the people at the centre.Sophie Careem · Founder
Tell us what you’re trying to solve.
One difficult vacancy, a specialist search, or the workforce gap behind it. Tell us, and a person will reply.
- A person reads it, usually within a working day.
- Whether we can help, and roughly how long it would take.
- Nothing shared beyond the conversation, and no commitment either way.
Recruiting directly and want help with a relocation offer of your own? Tell us in the form.
Looking for a healthcare role? Start at current opportunities.
Six fields. A person reads it — usually a reply within a working day, with a clear answer on whether we can help.