Valvira grants, upon application, the right to practice as a licensed or authorised professional and authorises the use of the occupational title of healthcare professional. Valvira registers all persons granted professional practice rights in the Terhikki-register. Both health care professionals who have graduated in Finland or abroad need to apply for licencing and the right to practice their profession.
If you have plans coming to Finland to work in the health care sector
The first thing to do is to learn Finnish or Swedish. All health care professionals working in Finland must be able to manage written and spoken Finnish or Swedish. Finland is officially a bilingual country and some 5% of the population speaks Swedish as their first language. Health care professionals must have by law sufficient oral and written language proficiency to allow them to perform their duties. Employers are required to avaluate whether a person has sufficient language proficiency. The Finnish National Board of Education grants two kinds of National Certificates of Language Proficiency and both of them are accepted by Valvira. The tests for the Certificates are quite demanding and Valvira requires that you pass with a Satisfactory grade, at least.