The number of Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) foreign nurses who have passed the national nursing examination and are still working at medical facilities in Japan, and in what capacity, remains unclear. Therefore, this study's purpose was to clarify the EPA foreign nurses' status and the factors influencing their continued employment at Japanese medical facilities. This study targeted 344 EPA foreign nurses who had passed the examination between the 97th nursing examination in 2008 and the 107th nursing examination in 2018. The research design employed a self-reported questionnaire using Facebook and Google Forms. Demographic characteristics and other factors were assessed using items related to recognition, support/resources, work engagement, degree of satisfaction, and status of employment continuation. Of 74 EPA foreign nurses whose questionnaires were complete, 51 (68.9%) continued to work and 23 (31.1%) did not. A chi-square test of the status of employment continuation, demographic characteristics, and other variables found significant differences with respect to nationality, age breakdown, and gender. Being Vietnamese, being younger than 30 years, and being male were significantly associated with continued working. Furthermore, a chi-square test of the status of employment continuation and support/resources indicated that there was a significant difference between the status of employment continuation and rent subsidy; that is, those who received a rent subsidy continued to work. A binomial logistic regression analysis also revealed a significant difference in support/resources. This study clarifies the current realities of EPA foreign nurses in Japan. It reveals that support/resources affect EPA foreign nurses' continued employment, and we provide suggestions for retaining their employment.

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Objective: It is to examine future issues by clarifying foreign technical intern trainees',health and life problems in Japan. It will contribute not only to their personal health management perspective, but also to the development of a system that supports health, life and a comfortable working environment.
Method: The search was performed using the Japanese medical database ICHUSHI, combining the keywords " foreign workers " , " technical internship system ", " technical intern trainee ", " health " and "life ". The contents written about the health and life problems of technical intern trainees were extracted so as to make one sentence one meaning, and used as an analysis unit (code). After that, the code was analyzed by a qualitative inductive method such as subcategory and category.
Results: Eighteen references were selected, and 5 categories and 16 subcategories were extracted from 104 codes. The categories were (1) Communication problems, (2) Health problems, (3) Differences from life and culture, (4) Labor environment problems, and (5) Human rights problems. Communication problems (1) were the most frequent with 33 codes, the subcategories were " lifetime communication " , " communication related to consultation ", " interpersonal problems " , and " communication at work ".
Discussion: It has become clear that the problems of their living in Japan are diverse. It is required to improve human relations in the workplace and daily life, and it is necessary to communicate closely with them

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Background : The number of foreign residents in Japan has been increasing yearly, and it is expected to increase in the future. Medical institutions are under pressure to internationalize, and the placement of medical interpreters is desired. However, at present there are not enough medical interpreters in Japan, and there are various issues concerning their education.
Objective : Identify the actual conditions of medical interpretation at hospitals and identify training issues for providing high quality medical interpretation.
Methods : From 2010 to 2011, we analyzed the implementation report on medical interpreting conducted in cooperation with an NPO and Gunma University Hospital.
Results : From 2010 to 2011, the number of patients and requests for interpretation increased seven times. Interpreted content is divided into five major categories: " related to treatment " , " related to hospital procedures " , " related to social welfare system " , " related to hospitalized life " , and " related to patient's daily life " " The treatment related " issues were the most common at 82.1%.
Conclusion : The increase in the number of medical interpreters used was due to a change in the awareness of medical workers. While there was no resistance to the use of medical interpretation, there were many problems on how medical interpreting was used. Hospitals have the highest need for interpretation in the process leading to diagnosis. We need to be educated as a medical interpreter who can fully support this process.

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Objective: To investigate the reality and issues about the current communication situations and quality of nursing care between ward nurses and international inpatients by comparing situations with or without the use of interpreters.
Method: The questionnaire survey (anonymous self-administered question paper) was conducted in October 2018 on 224 ward nurses working in A hospital. The data of the questionnaire were analyzed using simple- and cross-tabulation.
Results: When asked whether they were able to provide international inpatients with the same quality of the nursing care as Japanese inpatients, 39.2% of nurses who took the help of family/friend interpreters agreed with the question. On the other hand, only 16.2% of nurses who did not take the help of any interpreters agreed with the question(p < 0.001). Many nurses agreed with both questions " Do you think it took more time to respond to international inpatients than to Japanese inpatients? " and " Have you ever struggled or felt confused while taking care of international inpatients? " irrespective of whether they took the help of any interpreters(p=0.099 and p=0.711, respectively).
Discussion: Taking the help of interpreters lets nurses provide better quality of care and more sufficient explanation to international patients. Irrespective of the presence of interpreter, tending to international patients is a big burden for ward nurses. Thus, it is necessary for health care facilities to improve the system to respond to international inpatients.

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