Introduction:

Chile has established itself as one of the largest migratory destinations in the region, a reason why health professionals’ migration has also increased; in this respect, they must accredit their training before any relevant Chilean authority. For the case of countries without current agreements, the diploma must be revalidated with the University of Chile.

Objective:

To describe the applications for revalidating diplomas issued by foreign universities corresponding to the eight majors belonging to the School of Medicine at University of Chile.

Methods:

This is a study designed following the positivist paradigm. Quantitative analysis methods were used, together with descriptive and cross-sectional methods based on secondary sources of information. The sample amounted to 1616 applications for revalidating health-related diplomas issued abroad. A quantitative analysis of descriptive statistics was performed using the STATA 16 software. The main variables considered were country issuing the diploma, diploma to be revalidated, and revalidation status. Once this analysis was completed, it was triangulated with a literary review carried out between June 2018 and April 2019, in order to establish if the description could be interpreted based on the brain drain phenomenon.

Results:

The majors with the highest application rates for revalidation were Medicine and Nursing. 32.55% of the applications corresponded to diplomas issued by Venezuelan universities; while 17.51% of the total, to Cuban universities, a reason why these are consolidated as the two main ones.

Conclusions:

Applications for revalidating diplomas have been growing over the years. Health professionals’ migration to Chile is not due to the brain drain phenomenon, but a consequence of the political and social changes in the region, as well as the Chilean political stability since the nineties.

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