title: Applying a typology of health worker migration to non-EU migrant doctors in Ireland.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Research on health worker migration in the Irish context has categorized migrant health workers by country or region of training (for example, non-EU nurses or doctors) or recruitment mechanism (for example, actively recruited nurses). This paper applies a new typology of health worker migrants - livelihood, career-oriented, backpacker, commuter, undocumented and returner migrants (European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies and WHO, vol. 2:129-152, 2014) - to the experiences of non-EU migrant doctors in Ireland and tests its utility for understanding health worker migration internationally.
  
  
  METHODS
  The paper draws on quantitative survey (N = 366) and qualitative interview (N = 37) data collected from non-EU migrant doctors in Ireland between 2011 and 2013.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Categorizing non-EU migrant doctors in Ireland according to the typology (European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies and WHO, vol. 2:129-152, 2014) offers insight into their differing motivations, particularly on arrival. Findings suggest that the career-oriented migrant is the most common type of doctor among non-EU migrant doctor respondents, accounting for 60 % (N = 220) of quantitative and 54 % (N = 20) of qualitative respondents. The authors propose a modification to the typology via the addition of two additional categories - the family migrant and the safety and security migrant.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Employing a typology of health worker migration can facilitate a more comprehensive understanding of the migrant medical workforce, a necessary prerequisite for the development of useful policy tools (European Observatory on Health Systems and Policies and WHO, vol. 2:129-152, 2014). The findings indicate that there is some fluidity between categories, as health worker motivations change over time. This indicates the potential for policy levers to influence migrant health worker decision-making, if they are sufficiently "tuned in" to migrant health worker motivation.
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Public Health Medicine, Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, 123 St. Stephen's Green, Dublin 2, Ireland. nhumphries@rcsi.ie.
authors.forename: Niamh
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Humphries
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Public Health Medicine, Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, 123 St. Stephen's Green, Dublin 2, Ireland. saramcaleese@rcsi.ie.
authors.forename: Sara
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: McAleese
authors.affiliation: Centre for Health Policy and Management, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland. tyrrelel@tcd.ie.
authors.forename: Ella
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Tyrrell
authors.affiliation: Centre for Health Policy and Management, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland. thomasst@tcd.ie.
authors.forename: Steve
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Thomas
authors.affiliation: Centre for Health Policy and Management, Trinity College Dublin, Dublin, Ireland. normandc@tcd.ie.
authors.forename: Charles
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Normand
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Public Health Medicine, Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, 123 St. Stephen's Green, Dublin 2, Ireland. rbrugha@rcsi.ie.
authors.forename: Ruairí
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Brugha
mesh_terms: D032882:Comprehension; D004641:Emigration and Immigration / Q000145:classification*; D006801:Humans; D007494:Ireland; D009042:Motivation; D010560:Personnel Selection; D010820:Physicians / Q000145:classification*; D014171:Transients and Migrants / Q000145:classification*