The most useful thing to do while your authorisation is under review is build your Norwegian — B2 is the gate to everything that follows — and, for many, take a support role that does not require authorisation, such as an assistant post at a nursing home. The one line not to cross: don’t practise your protected profession, or use its title, until you are authorised.
Keep building your Norwegian — it is the real bottleneck
The wait is not empty time; it is the window in which to reach or consolidate B2 Norwegian, because the language is what unlocks the courses and the fagprøve that come after. For applicants trained outside the EU/EEA, the three-year clock on the additional requirements starts once your education is assessed as equivalent — so arriving at that point with B2 already in hand, rather than starting it then, is one of the biggest advantages you can give yourself.
Of the four subtests, speaking is the one you can rehearse out loud in the exam’s own format, and it is the part most people leave until last — which is what muntligb1.com is built around. Whatever else you do while you wait, treat steady Norwegian practice as the through-line.
Bridge work: support roles you can take without authorisation
You cannot practise as a nurse, doctor, dentist or pharmacist in Norway without authorisation — those are protected professions. But you can be employed in a role that does not require it: municipal care services take on assistants, care assistants and care workers (assistent, pleieassistent, pleiemedarbeider) without authorisation, typically at nursing homes, sheltered housing or in home-care services.
For someone waiting on authorisation, a bridge role like this does three things at once: it brings in income, it puts you inside the Norwegian care system so its routines stop being unfamiliar, and it surrounds you with working Norwegian all day. Employers generally expect solid Norwegian even for these posts, so the job reinforces the language work rather than replacing it.
The line to keep clear is the title. A support role is genuinely a support role — you must not be employed as, or present yourself as, your protected profession until you are authorised. Ensuring staff hold the right authorisation for their role is the employer’s legal responsibility as well as yours, and unauthorised practice is something the authorities follow up, so take the assistant post as exactly that.
One separate point worth flagging cleanly: whether you may take any job in Norway also depends on your residence and work permit, which is a matter for UDI, not Helsedirektoratet — a different agency and a different question from authorisation, and one this guide does not cover.
Praksis and keeping your clinical skills current
Alongside paid support work, a practice placement (praksis) — often arranged through the municipal introduction programme, usually a month or a few — keeps your clinical instincts and your Norwegian both warm, and can lead into assistant work afterwards. If you are eligible for the introduction programme, your programme adviser can help arrange a placement in a care setting.
For a few applicants a limited licence (lisens) may also be a route to some supervised work before full authorisation, but whether it fits your profession and situation is a question to put directly to Helsedirektoratet rather than to assume.
Should you leave your current job?
There is no single right answer here, and it is a personal decision rather than one this article can make for you — so treat what follows as factors to weigh, not advice. Processing can take a while and its length is not fully predictable, so a stable income matters; against that, a Norwegian-language workplace is itself daily language practice, and moving into the care sector early can build familiarity and contacts. Many people find it wiser not to give up a secure position until their authorisation is actually in hand, precisely because the timeline is uncertain — but your finances, your family situation and how far along your application is all pull differently. If it is a close call, it is worth talking through with people who know both you and the Norwegian system.
The mindset for the wait
A review period can feel like limbo, but it reads better as preparation. The applicants who come through it most smoothly are usually the ones who used the time to get their Norwegian to B2 and stayed close to the field, so that when the decision comes they are ready to move rather than starting from cold. None of the waiting is a verdict on the clinical competence you already have — you know your profession; this stretch is about the language and the paperwork catching up with it. Kept in that frame, the wait becomes the run-up rather than the hold-up.