The medical workforce is set to grow over the next 25 years, but significant concerns remain about the distribution of practitioners across specialties and locations.
A Whole of Medical Workforce report released by the Department of Health presents long-term projections of supply and demand for medical practitioners. It forecast increases in both the undersupply and oversupply of certain types of doctors.
Overall supply is likely to remain balanced over the next 25 years, with supply expected to reach more than 225,751 full time equivalent doctors by 2048, a little below the estimated demand of 227,490.
However, the report states a key challenge will be that medical practitioners are not optimally distributed across specialties, sectors, settings and locations to meet the needs of the Australian community.
The nation already has a shortage of specialists and registrars with the gaps between current numbers in the workforce and the required numbers expected to grow.
There is expected to be in undersupply of almost 7000 specialists by 2033, with this deficit increasing to 12,812 by 2048.
RELATED: GP deserts putting patients and practitioners at risk
Conversely, the number of hospital prevocational doctors is expected to increase significantly over the same period to the point that there could be more than 10,000 doctors with such qualifications who are excess to demand in 2048.
There are also expected to be more hospital career medical officers trained than will be needed.
AMA National President Dr Danielle McMullen said the projected undersupply of registrars and specialists was the most alarming. She called for urgent action, including the establishment of an independent health workforce planning agency.
“For many years the federal AMA has advocated for improved workforce planning and the need to re-establish an independent workforce planning agency that can guide workforce policy and funding,” Dr McMullen said.
“This report confirms just how urgently this is needed and what the community is experiencing — that while the medical workforce is growing, we are seeing severe shortages of doctors in geographical areas and some specialties.
“It also confirms Australia will remain heavily reliant on international medical graduates, who are an incredibly important part of our workforce, but we need to build a more sustainable and effective domestic training pipeline. While Australia had invested heavily in increased medical student numbers, there has been a failure to plan for the needs of the community.”
She said the projected shortage of specialists and specialist training positions in the report was one of the key reasons Australians were increasingly struggling to access the care they needed.
“A failure to plan is seeing more medical students enter the workforce, but we are not seeing the necessary investment in downstream training places that deliver enough fully fledged GPs and non-GP specialists to provide care in the community,” she said.
“We have seen some welcome investments by the federal government in additional GP training places but more needs to be done and the states and territories also need to do more so that the supply of other training places matches community need.”
The WA picture
Given WA’s unique geography and population demographics, the report cautioned that conventional supply and demand modelling may not adequately capture the needs of the state.
It noted Perth’s metro-centric training model presents challenges when considering the expansion of specialist training positions, as it does not align with the workforce needs of the broader, more dispersed community.
“Therefore, WA faces growing workforce shortages and relies heavily on visiting medical officers and locum doctors to service the WA Country Health Service.”
The report also highlighted WA’s significant reliance on specialist international medical graduates to complement the local workforce.
WA’s junior medical workforce is currently supplemented by about 400 overseas trained junior doctors per year, who are often employed on short-term contracts aimed at attracting those seeking international experience.
It noted this reliance contributed to high attrition rates, as a considerable proportion of these junior doctors do not remain in WA for the full year.
“These factors result in seasonal fluctuations in both workforce supply and service demand, which may not be fully captured by the supply and demand modelling method used in this study.”
Want more news, clinicals, features and guest columns delivered straight to you? Subscribe for free to WA’s only independent magazine for medical practitioners.
Want to submit an article? Email [email protected]