For social and healthcare employers

The right to practise as a social welfare or health care professional is granted by Valvira on application to professionals trained in Finland and abroad. Employers must ensure that their social welfare or health care professionals have an up-to-date right to practise, i.e. are qualified to work as a professional.

Review of an employee's right to practise

Valvira maintains the central registers of social welfare and health care professionals (Suosikki and Terhikki, respectively). Rights to practise that are granted are registered in Terhikki or Suosikki. The details of a professional’s right to practise or their personal data may have changed since they were granted the right to practise. It is thus important to consult the public information service (JulkiTerhikki or JulkiSuosikki) to verify that the information you have on a professional’s qualifications is up to date. The data in the public information service are updated once a day. Expired rights to practise and details of written warnings or reprimands entered in the register are not included in the public information service, and neither are employment details.

It is important to note that there may be more than one social and health professional with the same name. The employer must make sure that they are looking at the right person. In case of uncertainty, consult the Valvira customer service for rights to practise (contact details below on this page). For detailed instructions on how to search in JulkiTerhikki and JulkiSuosikki, click here.

Valvira may grant the following to a social welfare or health care professional:

1. the right to practise as a licensed professional
2. the right to use protected professional title
3. a limited right to practise
4. student rights for medical, dental and pharmacy students
5. a temporary right to practise medicine in Finland under the direction and supervision of a licensed medical practitioner appointed in writing  
6. limited drug prescription rights (in Finnish)
7. the right to provide services on a temporary and occasional basis provision of services
8. registration as a person completing an adaptation period  
9. recognition of professional qualification 
10. a European Professional Card (nurses, pharmacists and physiotherapists)

Social welfare and health care professionals are divided into legalised professionals and professionals using a protected occupational title. Only persons duly legalised by Valvira are allowed to perform the duties of legalised social welfare and health care professionals. By contrast, duties in positions under a protected occupational title in social welfare and health care may also be performed by professionals who have not registered a protected occupational title. When an employer hires a person to work as a professional under a protected occupational title, the employer is responsible for ascertaining that the person hired is competent to undertake those duties.

Not all health care professionals using a protected occupational title need to be approved by Valvira; some gain the right to use their title automatically by virtue of their training. For example, practical nurses in health care services are professionals who gain the right to use a protected occupational title through regulated training. Not all of them have entered their details in the Valvira register, but they are nevertheless qualified health care professionals. Employers may choose to require registration of a practical nurse. Protected occupational titles in social welfare may only be used in their employment by persons granted such a protected occupational title and entered as such in the register maintained by Valvira.

Employer's obligation to assess the language skills of the professional 

Employers are required to evaluate whether an employee has sufficient language proficiency in order to perform their duties.

In some situations, Valvira may ask the employer for a statement on the language skills of a professional. Such a statement must contain the following information:

• place of employment and date(s) of employment 
• job duties 
• evaluation of written and spoken language proficiency, reading comprehension and speech comprehension

The person issuing the statement must be someone who has been able to evaluate the employee’s language proficiency in practice. Valvira will assess the report on a case-by-case basis.

Acting as a student mentor

The employer must evaluate the competence of students on a case-by-case basis to evaluate which duties they are competent to perform. If the native language of the student to be hired is not Finnish or Swedish, the employer must also assess the student's linguistic competence. The employer must also define the student's duties, responsibilities, limits of activity and other obligations in sufficient detail in advance. In addition, the employer must ensure that the student’s studies have been successfully completed. Even if the student is recruited through an agency, it is up to the operating unit to assess the above. Read more about what to consider when hiring a student.