THE dependence of the NHS on nurses from overseas to boost staff numbers is only a short-term "fix", nursing leaders have warned.

A report for the Royal College of Nursing (RCN) said that 45 per cent of entrants to the nursing register come from abroad, often from developing countries.

They warned that the Government's reliance on international recruitment to increase the nursing workforce may not be sustainable in the future.

In the past three years, about 40,000 international nurses have registered in the UK, the main sources being the Philippines, South Africa, Australia and India.

North-East hospitals have recruited hundreds of overseas nurses in recent years.

The Department of Health says that since 1997 it has recruited 67,500 nurses.

But the RCN report said that without the "fix" of international nurses, all the money spent on increasing numbers of UK-trained nurses would not have resulted in any significant overall improvement.

The UK is banned from recruiting nurses from developing countries such as Ghana, but many still come in the hope of a better quality of life.

The figures reveal that between 2001 and 2003, almost 10,000 people from Third World countries registered to work as nurses in the UK.

Liz Twist, Northern regional head of health for the Unison trade union, called for greater protection for overseas nurses to stop them being exploited by private nursing homes.

A spokeswoman for South Tees Hospitals NHS Trust said they had recruited about 80 nurses from Spain, the Philippines and India.