Japanese nursing exam to include English translation

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TOKYO —
The health ministry plans to use English words to explain difficult Japanese terms in the national nursing examination for foreigners from the next test in February, Shinya Adachi, parliamentary secretary for the ministry, said Monday. A panel will decide on details of measures to help foreign nurses and caregivers understand Japanese when they take the exam, Adachi said.

The ministry is considering including English translations for technical terms, including disease names, in the exam, while clarifying subjects and predicates in Japanese sentences to make Japanese more easily understood by applicants.

‘‘Next year’s national exam will be considerably different from the previous tests,’’ Adachi said at a news conference.

More than 1,000 applicants have come to Japan from Indonesia and the Philippines under the bilateral free trade agreement, but the pass rate for the exam remains low, as kanji characters and technical terms used in the exam are believed to pose a high hurdle for foreign examinees.