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Health care challenges
The pressure on health care is a multifaceted issue affecting those working in the health care sector. Increasing workloads, inadequate resources, and high-stress environments contribute to their exhaustion. B. Braun has solutions to adress these problems.
Health care crisis: at first glance, this is a rather abstract term. But when you visit a hospital, you find out what it means in concrete terms. Prof Dr Wolfgang Buhre, President of the European Society of Anaesthesiology and Intensive Care Medicine (ESAIC), puts it in a nutshell: "The first thing patients notice is that the waiting times are longer, and diagnostics can be dangerously delayed as a result. This is what we mean by a health care crisis." But there are even more serious consequences: "The more pronounced the crisis is, the less time carers have to look after patients, and the greater the risk of human error." Time pressure in clinical settings can have serious consequences: Catheters are placed wrongly, infections are overlooked, medication is administered incorrectly. This much is clear: The health care crisis is an international phenomenon, with a shortage of medical staff in all countries, albeit to varying degrees.
We are dealing with a highly complex system in which aging societies, challenging working conditions, immigration and emigration, each play a specific role. None of these factors can be resolved in the short term, and there is no single, simple solution. Wolfgang Buhre, who is also Professor of Perioperative Medicine and Anesthesiology at UMC Utrecht, also puts the brakes on hopes of purely technical solutions, such as robotics: "There will certainly be care robots one day, but in my opinion not in the next 20 years." Nevertheless, there are also reasons for optimism: "We can solve the crisis," says Professor Buhre, "if everyone joins forces and works on the efficiency of care systems." B. Braun is making a decisive contribution here by simplifying medical, nursing and administrative activities, which can lead to more time for patient care.
Staff shortage
The shortage of health care workers is a global crisis. The World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that by 2030, the shortfall in health workers worldwide will be 10 million. Nurses alone will account for half of that number.
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more nurses needed in the global health care system by 2030.
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Nursing vacancies in the UK‘s National Health Service in 2021.
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Nationwide health worker shortage in the United States by 2026.
A shortage of and an increased workload of medical staff will have serious impacts on global health. “Nurses shoulder some of the biggest health care burdens,” United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said when declaring 2020 the International Year of the Nurse and the Midwife. “They perform difficult work and endure long hours, while risking injury, infection and the mental health burden that accompanies such traumatic work.”
This analysis reveals the varying density of health care staff per 1,000 inhabitants in selected countries, highlighting significant disparities and the pressing need for strategic workforce planning in health care systems worldwide.
Number of medical doctors (grey) and nurses (green) per 1000 inhabitants. 2018 data or latest year available.
In low-income countries, existing inequalities in access to health care are projected to get worse. Whereas in Britain there are more than eight nurses per 1,000 people, there are less than five in the Philippines and and only two in India, for example. According to WHO, Africa will account for 52 percent of the shortage in health workers in 2030.
With aging populations pushing up the demand for nursing and care, the shortage of health care staff is just as acute in high-income countries. 87 percent of U.S. health care providers report staffing shortages as their biggest challenge. WHO estimates that Europe will have about 830,000 fewer nurses in 2030 than it has today.
“Why do nursing staff have to type out important information on a computer? Couldn't that be recorded using a dictation function and transcribed using the appropriate software?”
Burnout, stress and attrition
Health care systems differ from country to country, but the reasons for the health care crisis are similar everywhere. Professor Buhre sums it up as follows: "A major feature of the health care crisis is that the attractiveness of the nursing profession is declining sharply. Young people are naturally realizing this and are therefore increasingly reluctant to work in this sector." A study carried out by the management consultants McKinsey in the USA, which can be seen as a prototype for the situation in countries in the Global North, discovered that a large proportion of staff consider their work to be "meaningful" and generally rate their interaction with patients positively. However, this barely compensates for the aspects of their work that are perceived as challenging and unmanageable.
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number of people who left the U.S. care sector during the pandemic.
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of surveyed nurses in Europe who say they intend to quit their jobs.
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of U.S. nurses who are thinking about quitting.
The consequences are serious: In 90% of developed countries, carers are dissatisfied with their work or even suffer from burnout. Between 2018 and 2022, the burnout rate among U.S. nurses increased by 15 percent.
“One of the biggest stress factors for nursing staff in hospitals is that the various work steps are barely synchronized with each other. There have long been technical solutions for this. ”
Burnout is also consistently cited as the most important reason for nursing staff changing jobs. The willingness to do so is alarmingly high. In September 2022, almost a third of all nurses in the USA were thinking about leaving their job, for example. In the UK, the figure was 36 percent, while in Japan 80 percent of hospital staff regularly think about quitting their job. In short, the situation is dramatic.
The exodus of health care professionals is driven by several critical factors. Key issues include burnout from high workloads, insufficient compensation, lack of career advancement opportunities, and inadequate support in the workplace. Addressing these concerns is vital to retain skilled nursing staff and ensure sustainable health care services.
Migration
As more and more health care providers around the world report a shortage of staff, it is clear that the world desperately needs more medical staff. Adding to the unequal health care access between countries, rich countries have increasingly come to rely on poorer ones for their medical staff, causing thousands of health care professionals to migrate every year.
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of all nurses in high-income countries are foreign-born or foreign-trained.
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of locally trained physicians in sub-Saharan Africa have migrated to high-income countries.
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nurses from the Philippines alone work in high-income OECD countries.
The resulting exodus can often lead to a shortage of qualified health personnel in countries that need them most. And it is not just nurses but also physicians, technicians, counselors, and other medical experts who are on the move. In half the countries in sub-Saharan Africa, more than a quarter of physicians trained locally have migrated to high-income countries.
Driven by disparities in wages, working conditions, and career opportunities, medical staff migration significantly impacts global health care. High-income countries attract nurses from lower-income regions, exacerbating local shortages. Understanding these migration patterns is crucial for developing policies that balance global health care needs and promote equitable workforce distribution.
OECD-countries with the most foreign-trained nurses (left side) & Top exporters of nurses to OECD countries (right side)
WHO data from 86 countries reveal that one out of eight nurses were born or trained in a country other than the one in which they currently practice. The proportion of foreign-born nurses is even higher in richer countries – for example, more than 25 percent of UK’s National Health Service (NHS) nurses report a nationality other than British. The number of foreign-trained nurses in Germany nearly doubled in five years to reach 14 percent in 2022, as qualified professionals from Eastern Europe and Turkey filled the gap between demand and supply.
Low wages, high nurse-to-patient ratios and limited opportunities are the main reasons for nurses and other health workers choosing to migrate. Malaysia is the perfect illustration of the loss of human resources in the health care sector. The World Bank estimates that Malaysia has lost approximately 20 percent of its trained medical professionals annually since the late 1990s. The increased workload on the country’s health care workers has had noticeable impacts on the overall job satisfaction in this sector, which one study says is only 30 percent.
Global staff shortages make health care professionals the most valuable resource in hospitals. Their most limited asset is time. Discover solutions to help free up precious time.
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