07/16/2016
Healthcare Job Outlook 2016
Job openings extensive in most healthcare sectors for 2016 and beyond
By Valerie Neff Newitt
"Help wanted." That's the universal message found throughout a healthcare industry analyses of the job outlook for 2016 and beyond. Additionally, that affirmative "we're hiring" nod is pervasive throughout most healthcare sectors.
"The past year has been nothing short of amazing for jobs in the healthcare industry," trumpeted AMN Healthcare recruitment services in its November 2015 Workforce Brief. It pointed to the recent Bureau of Labor Statistics report that 495,000 healthcare jobs had been added to the employment roster in a 1-year period, with nearly 45,000 healthcare jobs added in the month of October 2015 alone. The growth is being touted as "unprecedented," outpacing healthcare employment growth for any other 12-month period on record.
Bureau of Labor Statistics employment projections for 2014-2024 predict that the upward trajectory of openings will continue. And while that is great news for job seekers, it belies a troubling reality within the healthcare industry: A gap is growing between openings and hires, due in part to too few healthcare job candidates.
According to AMN Healthcare, "Since the beginning of 2014, job openings in the healthcare and social sector... have increased approximately 44%, while job hires increased only 3%. Meanwhile, job separations - retirements, layoffs, quits, etc. - have remained static. At the end of July 2015, hundreds of thousands of open healthcare jobs had not been filled by hires ... It's clear that the growing gap... is caused by rising demand for healthcare services and constrained supply of healthcare professionals."
Indeed, most healthcare job titles are fertile ground for employment. The Bureau of Labor Statistics identifies 14 of the 30 occupations with the largest percentage of expected growth between 2012 and 2022 as "healthcare related." Leading the healthcare group in growth are: organizational psychologists, personal care aides, home health aides, diagnostic medical sonographers, occupational therapist assistants, genetic counselors, physical therapist assistants, physical therapy aides, occupational therapy aides, health specialties teachers, medical secretaries, physical therapists, orthotists and prosthetists, nursing instructors, nurse practitioners, audiologists, dental hygienists, therapists, and substance abuse and behavioral disorder counselors.
A Flip for RNs
With a continuing graying of the nursing population resulting in Baby Boomer-aged RNs, one might expect nurses to be the top "in demand" position. But while experienced nurses and nurses in specific specialty areas will always be a target of recruitment, the Health Resources and Services Administration's (HRSA) workforce simulation projects a flip from demand to supply by 2025.
According to HRSA's report The Future of the Nursing Workforce: National- and State-Level Projections, 2012-2025, "... assuming RNs continue to train at the current levels and accounting for new entrants and attrition, the RN supply is expected to grow by 952,000 full-time employees (FTEs) - from 2,897,000 FTEs in 2012 to 3,849,000 FTEs in 2025 - a 33% increase nationally." However the report also states, "The nationwide demand for RNs, however, is projected to grow by only 612,000 FTEs - from 2,897,000 FTEs in 2012 to 3,509,000 FTEs in 2025 - a 21% increase."
That said, the report also points to the many emerging models of care that will likely result in an expansion of RN roles in preventive care and care coordination, and which will even out that supply-and-demand gap.
In fact, the Center for Health Workforce Studies, in the School of Public Health at the State University of New York University at Albany, pegged registered nurses, home health aides and personal care aides as the positions with the largest job growth between 2010 and 2020, due to vacancies from attrition and expanded utilization.
Any way you slice it, healthcare jobs are on the rise and are claiming a larger wedge of the national employment pie. There's never been a greater need for trained professionals, nor a better time to follow a career path that leads to quality healthcare.
Newitt is on staff at ADVANCE. Contact: [email protected].