In the past, many OECD countries did not train enough health workers to respond to current and future needs. Training programmes need to be modernised to promote greater teamwork and proficiency in digital skills.
Health workforce
While the supply of health workers has increased over the past few decades in OECD countries, the demand for healthcare has also increased due to population ageing. In order to address health workforce shortages, countries should increase the training of new health professionals, increase staff retention by improving working conditions, and encourage innovation related to work organisation and the use of new technologies to respond efficiently to the growing demand for care.
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Key messages
Many health workers are reporting burnout, job dissatisfaction and intention to leave following the pandemic. For example, surveys in several countries indicate that more than one in five nurses were contemplating leaving their job.
Shortages of doctors can be alleviated through greater task sharing with nurses, pharmacists and other paramedical professions.
According to latest data available, 24% of doctors in the OECD were foreign born and 19% foreign trained, and 16% of nurses were foreign born and 9% foreign trained, but there are wide variations across countries.
Context
New medical graduates
The number of new medical graduates helps to assess the number of new doctors who will be available to replace retiring doctors and respond to any growing demands. The number of new medical graduates across OECD countries increased from 93 000 in 2000 to 160,000 in 2021. In 2021, the number of new medical graduates ranged from about 7 per 100,000 people in Israel, Japan and Korea to more than 20 per 100,000 in Latvia, Ireland, Denmark and Lithuania. However, in some countries, a large number of new medical graduates are international students who do not have the intention to stay in the country after graduation.
Nurses outnumber doctors in nearly all countries
Nurses play a central role in healthcare and delivering patient-centred care. In many countries, the roles of nurses also expanded before and during the pandemic, particularly in providing care for people with chronic conditions. On average across the OECD, there are 2.5 nurses for every doctor, but there are wide variations in the use of nurses and doctors across countries. The ratio of nurses per doctor ranges from about one nurse per doctor in Colombia, Mexico and Latvia to more than four in Finland, Japan, the United States and Switzerland.
Health workforce migration
While it takes many years to train new doctors and nurses, recruiting them from abroad can provide a quicker solution to address immediate shortages, although it may exacerbate shortages in countries of origin. Several OECD countries, including Australia, Canada, Ireland, Israel, New Zealand, Switzerland, the United Kingdom and the United States, have traditionally relied on the international recruitment of doctors and nurses, and the share of foreign-trained doctors and nurses has increased in most OECD countries since 2010. Unless OECD countries train more doctors and nurses and retain them longer in health systems, further increase in foreign health workers can be expected in many countries.
